Charles Robert Gatewood was a photographer, writer, videographer, artist and educator, his photographic themes have included deviant behavior, the Mardi Gras and the Wall Street area of New York City.
Background
Charles Robert Gatewood was born on November 8, 1942 in Elgin, Illinois, United States. From ages one to three Charles Gatewood lived with his father, John Jay Gatewood (a traveing salesman) and his mother, Clarene Hall Gatewood (a housewife) near Dallas, Texas. In 1945 the family moved to Rolla, Missouri, where Gatewood's father found work as a traveling salesman.
Education
In 1951, the Gatewood family moved to Springfield, Missouri, where Charles Gatewood attended J.P Study Jr. High and Parkview High School. From 1960 to 1964, Charles Gatewood attended the University of Missouri, majoring in Anthropology and taking a minor in art history. In 1964, as he was finishing his first year of graduate work, Gatewood met George W. Gardner, a gifted student photographer.
From 1964 to 1966, Charles Gatewood lived and worked in Stockholm, Sweden. He enrolled at the University of Stockholm to study sociology and apprenticed with a group of documentary photographers. In 1965, after exploring Europe, he returned to Sweden and found work as a darkroom technician for AB Text & Bilder, a Stockholm news agency. At night, he took advantage of his press pass and the agency's sophisticated equipment to photograph jazz concerts and happenings.
Career
On April 29, 1966, Charles Gatewood photographed the press conference and concert of musician Bob Dylan. Other celebrity photos taken by Gatewood during this time include pictures of Martin Luther King, Jr., Ornette Coleman, Sonny Rollins, Joan Baez, Duke Ellington and Ella Fitzgerald.
In June, 1966, Charles Gatewood returned to the United States, rented an apartment on Manhattan's Lower East Side, and found work as second assistant at Jaffe-Smith photography studio in Greenwich Village. Ten months later, after learning studio photography techniques and advanced darkroom skills, he quit Jaffee-Smith and began his career as a freelance photographer.
Charles Gatewood rented part of a photography studio at 8 East 12th Street, and sold photos to textbooks, magazines, poster companies, and other editorial markets. From 1970 to 1974 he worked as staff photographer for the Manhattan Tribune. He also photographed on assignment for The New York Times, Rolling Stone, Harper's, Business Week, Time and other magazines.
In 1972 and 1976, Charles Gatewood was awarded CAPS fellowships by the New York State Arts Council. In 1975, Sidetripping, Gatewood's first photography book, was published, with text by William S. Burroughs.
From 1978 to 1987, Charles Gatewood lived near Woodstock, New York, and worked in Manhattan and elsewhere. His photos from this period include one of social protests, rock festivals, Mardi Gras in New Orleans, body modification, outlaw bikers, and nature. The celebrities he captured images of include Larry Clark, Annie Sprinkle, Michael O'Donoghue, Ira Cohen and Quentin Crisp.
In 1984 the New York State Arts Council awarded Gatewood a grant to publish Wall Street photographs, and in 1985 the book Wall Street was awarded the Leica Medal of Excellence for Outstanding Humanistic Photojournalism. In 1985, a feature film about Gatewood, titled "Dances Sacred and Profane", premiered at the Antwerp Film Festival and was screened in U.S theaters to critical acclaim.
From 1987, Charles Gatewood lived and worked in San Francisco, California. From 1998 to 2010, he was a photographer for Skin and Ink magazine. During this period, he produced over thirty documentary videos about body modification, fetish fashion and other alternative interests. Gatewood's photo books from this period include A Complete Unknown, Burroughs 23, Badlands, True Blood, The Body and Beyond and Primitives. In 1986 Pocket Books published his novel Hellfire.
Charles Gatewood died in San Francisco on April 28, 2016, after sustaining serious injuries in a fall from his balcony three weeks earlier, in an apparent suicide attempt. He left several notes behind. He was 73.