John
Dominis
*1921
“That’s my technique with people. I’m sort of a fly on the wall. You
try not to interfere, hang around, hope that they don’t even notice you, and
if they do, they don’t care.”
Jacques d'Amboise,
1962
Oceanliner 'Oriana' Suez Canal. 1962
Born
in Los Angeles, John Dominis studied photography at Freemont High School with C.
A. Bach, an outstanding and demanding teacher. Remembers Dominis, "He'd
give assignments, bawl you out, make you reshoot." Eight of the
photographers that Bach trained later got staff jobs on LIFE magazine.
Among
his memorable essays Dominis covered the 1956 Olympics in Australia - the first
of six he photographed; water buffaloes and their boy keepers in Thailand; the
celebrations for Buddha's 2500th birthday in Burma; the Laotian troops; the
early years of the Vietnam war; John Kennedy's "I am a Berliner"
speech; Woodstock; Nixon's trip to China; and entertainers such as Frank
Sinatra, John Wayne, Steve McQueen, Dustin Hoffman, Robert Redford, Pearl Bailey
and Jacques D'Amboise.
Dominis
became photo editor of People magazine (1974 - 78) and then Sports Illustrated
(1978 - 1982). Returning to freelance photography, Dominis shot the photographs
for five Italian cookbooks, on location with Giuliano Bugialli, food writer and
teacher.
© by Galerie Stephen Hoffman