Background
Shterenberg, Abram was born in 1894 in into the family of an artisan in the town of Zhitomir in the Ukraine.
Shterenberg, Abram was born in 1894 in into the family of an artisan in the town of Zhitomir in the Ukraine.
At the age of 15, began his photographic training, and soon became a professional photographer. In 1919, joined the Red Army. As a soldier, worked in B. Kapustianskii’s photo atelier in Tashkent, Uzbekistan.
Attended a school of art and design, and worked in the army’s photographic department. In 1922, settled in Moscow, living with his brother David, a well-known painter. In the mid-1920s, began his career as a photo-journalist.
Worked in the photographic service of the People’s Commissariat for Transport, for the picture agencies Russfoto, Unifoto, Soiuzfoto and for the Photographic Artists Studio of the State Cinema Publishing House. Soon acquired the reputation of being a powerful portrait photographer. His photographs of writers and artists, both Russian and foreign, are unique.
50 of his pictures were displayed at the 1928 exhibition, 10 Years of Soviet Photography. Close to Rodchenko, Ignatovich and other fellow-members of the October group. After being accused of formalism, he stuck to news photography, but eventually returned to portraiture.
As a news photographer, took pictures of parades and demonstrations in Red Square. One of the leading photographers covering the m eting between the Soviet icebreaker Malygin and the German airship Graf Zeppelin. Experimented also with landscape and still-life photography.
During the 1930s, exhibited several times in Russia and abroad. During World War II, a corporal in the signals. In the post-war years, disappeared from public life, but continued to work for the Novosti press agency.
His last 15 years were lived in isolation, totally forgotten.