“The camera is superior to the eye, and the photograph can, and ideally should, portray the world more graphic than reality itself.”

Andreas Feininger combines an architect's love of precision, space, and technique with an artist's love of sweeping vistas. Although an American citizen, Feininger did not come to the United States until he was 33. Son of the late acclaimed artist Lyonel Feininger, he was born in Paris in 1906, and graduated with highest honors in architecture from schools in Germany. At the time, Feininger was using a camera as a reference aid in creating his building designs. The camera became his "mechanical sketchbook."

Commissions were scarce for non-European citizens in the depressed economy. After a year's work in France for the legendary architect Le Corbusier, followed by a struggle to find employment in Stockholm, Feininger turned his attention full-time to photography. He sold his first photos in 1932, moved with his family to the United States in 1939, and in 1943 became a staff photographer for LIFE magazine where he completed more than 430 assignments in a twenty year span.