Background
Nickolas Muray was born on February 15, 1892, in Szeged, Hungary.
Nickolas Muray was born on February 15, 1892, in Szeged, Hungary.
Nickolas Muray studied sculpture as a boy and apprenticed in an engraving from 1904 to 1908, receiving an International Engraver's Certificate. About 1909 he studied color photoengraving in Germany and took an advanced three-year course in which he learned how to make color filters.
Nickolas Muray worked part-time at engraving in the United States and shared a photo studio from 1918 to 1924. In 1924 he rented a large studio of his own and freelanced for magazines such as Vanity Fair, Harper's Bazaar, Ladies’ Home Journal and McCall’s. He was the official photographer for Wenner-Gren Foundation for Anthropological Research on an eight-month around-the-world expedition directed by Dr. Paul Fejos. Nickolas Muray participated in the 1922 London exhibition.
The photographer was also renowned internationally as a fencer, competing for thirty years and noted as one of the greatest fencers in American history. He also contended with épée and foil. Nickolas Muray additionally wrote magazine articles on dance.
The photographer specialized in portraiture of famed personalities in the artistic, literary, musical, theatrical, and political worlds.