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Photographer, filmmaker, graphic designer, illustrator, and composer. Delano’s family came to Philadelphia in 1923 after fleeing the chaos of the Russian Revolution in 1917. He studied music at the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia and later studied illustration and design at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, where he received a grant to travel to Europe. There, he became interested in photography, and when he returned to Philadelphia he was hired by the Federal Art Project, the arts division of the Works Progress Administration. Master photographer Paul Strand saw an exhibition of Delano’s photographs and urged him to move to New York, where he met Irene (soon to be his wife), with whom he traveled, eventually, in 1941, to Puerto Rico for a documentary project with the Farm Security Administration, which had hired him on Roy Stryker’s recommendation. In 1946 he settled on the island definitively. His great contribution to art in Puerto Rico occurred when he took part in the organization of the Cinema and Graphics Unit (CGU) of the Commission of Parks and Recreation (the CGU later becoming the Division of Community Education); he was ever-active in producing documentaries, films, and photographs, and took part in the island’s first years of television and radio. In the late eighties, the Smithsonian Institution published a book of his photographs titled Puerto Rico Mio: Four Decades of Change.
I didn’t know that there were rules governing the style of documentary photography. In fact, I don’t think that the term is very accurate. As far as I’m concerned, the photography that I made for the FSA remains the same to the one I still practice. It is based on a passionate interest in the human condition. This is the philosophical basis of all work I do. I am interested in people, not only as photographic images, but as persons. While I interviewed them, I always paid attention to their stories. I believed that it was very important what they had to say, what I would try to communicate to others.
Jack Delano, 1993
Source: Contrastes: Cuarenta Años de Cambio y Continuidad en Puerto Rico, Fotografía de Jack Delano, Museo de Arte de Ponce, Ponce, Puerto Rico, October 12, 1995- January 28, 1996.
1924-1932
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De San Juan a Ponce en tren. San Juan, Puerto Rico: Editorial de la Universidad de Puerto Rico,1990.
Puerto Rico Mio. Washington DC, Estados Unidos: Smithsonian Institution Press,1990.
Sabios Árboles, Mágicos Árboles. San Juan, Puerto Rico: Fideicomiso de Conservación de Puerto Rico, 1974.
Hermandad de Artistas Gráficos de Puerto Rico. Puerto Rico Arte e Identidad. San Juan, P.R.: Editorial de la Universidad de Puerto Rico, 1998.
A Vision Shared. Nueva York, Estados Unidos: St. Martin’s Press, 1976.
In This Proud Land. Nueva York, Estados Unidos: The New York Graphic Society, 1973.
Portrait of a Decade. Louisiana, Estados Unidos: Louisiana State University Press, 1972.
American Photographers of the Depression. Pantheon Books, Nueva York y Centre National de la Fotographie, Paris, 1985.
Contrastes: 40 años de cambio y continuidad en Puerto Rico, Una exposición de fotografías por Jack Delano. Museo de Arte de Ponce, Ponce, Puerto Rico, 1995.
Selección de la Colección “Contrastes”, Liga de Arte de San Juan, San Juan, Puerto Rico, 1994.
Jourdes, Julien. Delano Prints, Galería Viota, San Juan, Puerto Rico, 2006.
“Films with a purpose”, Festival de cine puertorriqueño en Nueva York, abril-mayo de 1987.
“Another Delano Success”. The San Juan Star (San Juan, PR), 31 d enero de 1991.
“Jack Delano, Clicking in Puerto Rico for 30 years”. The San Juan Star (San Juan, PR), junio de 1975.
“Jack Delano artista y borincano por amor”. El Nuevo Día (San Juan, PR), 25 de octubre de 1987.
“Jack Delano”. The San Juan Star (San Juan, PR), 11 de diciembre de 1977.
“Las Fotos de Jack Delano”. El Mundo (San Juan, PR), 5 de diciembre de 1982.
“The serious pleasure of commitment- the Delanos gifts”. The San Juan Star (San Juan, PR), 11 de enero de 1981.
“Tributo a dos artistas”. El Mundo (San Juan, PR), 19 de junio de 1981.
A tribute to the Delanos. The San Juan Star (San Juan, PR), 26 de julio de 1981.
Alegre Barrios, Mario. “Jack Delano y el arte como reflejo de la condición humana”. El Nuevo Día (San Juan, PR), 28 de agosto de 1994, pp. 90-91.
El Nuevo Día (San Juan, PR), 25 de octubre de 1987.
Enjunto Rangel, Cecilia. “Don Jack, un boricua auténtico”. El Nuevo Día (San Juan, PR), 28 de agosto de 1984, p. 92.
Maldonado Martínez, M. “Jack Delano, maestro del cine puertorriqueño”. El Reportero (San Juan, PR), 4 de febrero de 1984.
Periódico Faro Vigo, España, 31 de octubre de 1991.
Reina, Pedro. “La simiente de Jack”. El Nuevo Día (San Juan, PR), 1 de octubre de 2007.
Becquer Casaballe. Jack Delano: La fuerza del testimonio fotográfico, Revista Foto Mundo (Argentina), núm. 325, mayo 1995, pp. 25-36, 44-46, 63-65.
Revista Nueva Luz, En Foco Inc., Nueva York, 1992.
