Bert Stern

Bert Stern (1929–2013) was an American photographer renowned for his groundbreaking contributions to fashion and commercial photography. Born in Brooklyn, New York, to Jewish immigrant parents, Stern was introduced to photography at a young age by his father, a children’s portrait photographer. He left high school at 16 and began working in the mail room at Look magazine, where he became a protégé of the art director—a connection that led to his first professional assignment as a commercial photographer.

As art director at Flair magazine, Stern learned to develop film and create contact sheets, honing his technical skills and visual sensibility. During the Korean War, he served in the United States Army in Japan, assigned to the photographic department. In the 1950s and 1960s, working in New York alongside contemporaries such as Irving Penn, Richard Avedon, and Mark Shaw, Stern helped redefine the role of photography in fashion and advertising, elevating commercial imagery to the level of fine art with his inventive compositions, use of lighting, and artistic vision.