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Norman Seeff | |
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| Born | 5 March 1939 Johannesburg, South Africa |
| Nationality | South African |
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Norman Seeff (born 5 March 1939) is a South African photographer and filmmaker. Since moving to the United States in 1969, his work has been focused on the exploration of human creativity and the inner dynamics of the creative process.
Seeff graduated with honors in science and art at King Edward VII School in Johannesburg. At the age of 17, he was drafted as the youngest player in the South African national soccer league.
Seeff qualified as a medical doctor in 1965. For three years he worked in emergency medicine at the Chris Hani Baragwanath Hospital in Soweto, focusing on the management of traumatic shock. In 1968, he immigrated to the United States to pursue his creative passions and artistic abilities.
Soon after Seeff arrived in New York City, his photographs of the people he encountered on the streets of Manhattan were discovered by the famed graphic designer Bob Cato. As the former Vice President of Creative Services at Columbia Records, Cato was renowned for his album cover design which had won two Grammy Awards. Cato became an important mentor to Seeff and gave him his first major photographic assignment producing images for the Band's Stage Fright album. Seeff's iconic image of the group was re-produced as a poster inserted under the album's shrink wrap, which when unfolded, became a hugely popular collector's item. This brought him immediate recognition and launched his career as a "rock" photographer. His early work also includes images of Debbie Harry, Patti Smith, Robert Mapplethorpe, Andy Warhol as well as other New York City personalities.
In 1971, Seeff spent a year as Professor of Photography at Bennington College in Vermont.
At the end of 1971 and on the recommendation of Cato, Seeff relocated to Los Angeles to become creative director of United Artists Records. His innovative approach to collaborative art-direction resulted in multiple Grammy Award nominations for graphic design.
Two years later, he opened an independent studio on the 'strip' on Sunset Boulevard. His photographic sessions soon became legendary and attracted audiences of 30–40 at each session, swelling to over 200 on some occasions.
In his evolution as a photographer of public personalities, Seeff realized that to accomplish the vitality and authenticity he was looking for in his images required a paradigm shift in his interaction with artists and innovators.
Creating the session as both a nurturing and challenging environment for a co-creative relationship with artists, it evolved as a laboratory for the exploration of the fundamental dynamics of creativity from the "inside" out. Responding to the emotional authenticity and depth of the creative communication between himself and artists, Seeff brought a film crew into a session for the first time in 1975, beginning with Ike and Tina Turner.
For Seeff, the session became the art-form itself, transforming into a multi-disciplinary process of photography, filmmaking and creative communication. Shifting his focus from ends to means and creating an authentic experience in the moment revealed that optimal experience flowed elegantly into optimal performance. For Seeff it was a personal paradigm shift in his understanding of the creative process.
Seeff has documented over 500 sessions with artists of many disciplines including musicians, actors, writers, directors, actors, scientists, entrepreneurs, and politicians. He has interacted with creators and innovators including Ray Charles, the Carpenters, Joni Mitchell, Guthrie Thomas, Kiss, Steve Jobs, Steve Martin, John Huston, Martin Scorsese, Billy Wilder, Bob Fosse, will.i.am, Tina Turner, Alicia Keys and Francis Crick.
In 1990, Seeff applied the spontaneous and co-creative approach he had developed during his photo sessions to working with actors in television commercials. During the 1990s, he became an acclaimed, award-winning director of hundreds of national commercials for major brands including Apple, Levi's, Glaxo, Nissan, Toyota, General Motors and Motorola.
Seeff returned to photography and the documentation of his sessions in 1999 in order to produce a documentary exploration of the artist's journey for the opening of Paul Allen's Experience Music Project and sessions with the stars of Paramount Television and Caltech's many Nobel Science Laureates.
It was the latter assignment that led to Seeff being invited to work with the NASA space explorers at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) and to the production of his documentary film Triumph of the Dream. The documentary reveals the human face of the Mars Exploration mission that landed two rovers on Mars in 2004. In the film, Seeff uses the [[:|Seven Stage Dynamic of the Creative Process]] he developed in his photo sessions as the underlying narrative structure.
Seeff's recent sessions have included an exploration of the world of electronic music with participants of the 2013 Red Bull Music Academy and the production of a web series for Red Bull Media House.
As a consequence of 35 years of research and development of creativity in action, Seeff has developed a body of content exploring the roots of creativity, innovation and optimal performance, and has identified schematics describing the archetypes of the creative process that function across all creative disciplines. The fundamental tenet of his work is that all creation is sourced in the inner resources of consciousness and that everyone has access to the same innate resources.
Seeff views himself as a conduit for the voices of the hundreds of creative and innovative individuals working at the higher reaches of human potential he has interacted with over many decades. He is now preparing this multi-media and multi-disciplinary content for global release via multiple interactive digital platforms.
Seeff lives in Los Angeles with his wife Sue Kiel and works out of his studio in Burbank. He has two children. His daughter, Tai Power Seeff, whom he shared with actress Taryn Power, is a photographer.
Seeff's first book, Hot Shots, published in 1974, was awarded the New York Art Directors Club Gold Medal for photography. His second book, Sessions, was published in 1988. In December 2018, he released JONI: THE JONI MITCHELL SESSIONS featuring images and insights from 12 sessions with the legendary artist from 1972 to 1985.
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