Best known for his classic “rock” photographs, Elliott Landy was one of the first “music photographers” to be recognised as an “artist.” His celebrated works include portraits of (Nashville Skyline), (Music From Big Pink, and The Band), (Big Brother & The Holding Company: Cheap Thrills), (Moondance) and many others. A photojournalist as well, his early images documented and supported the rising tide of anti-war sentiment and spiritual awakening throughout the United States during the late 1960s.
Elliott’s iconic photographs of Dylan and The Band during the years they resided and recorded in the small arts colony of Woodstock, New York and his coverage of the 1969 Woodstock Festival, for which he was an official photographer have become synonymous with the town, the famed 1969 Music Festival and the Utopian spirit of the Woodstock Generation.
The ideals of both personal and social freedom are reflected in his later work (combining elements of impressionist painting with photography), and in the spiritual and artistic depth of several photo veritй series of his family which lovingly capture the spontaneity of life and the wonder of love at any age.
Since 1967 Elliott’s work has been published and exhibited in galleries and museums worldwide. He has published nine books of his photography. His latest monograph, published in 2016, was the highest-funded photographic book in Kickstarter history.
Elliott has also created a new App. LandyVision™ that lets the user blend still and moving imagery with music to create an interactive sound and visual experience that has never been seen before.
“I love photography. It has always been good to me. It has taken me to places I loved being, helped me to connect with many lovely and special people and allowed me to share with others some of my deepest experiences.
I was lucky. In the early days of my career I chose to photograph people and events that later came to be socially and culturally significant. But when I was photographing in the Hunter College Auditorium, or in the Anderson Theater on New York’s Lower East Side, neither event had, then or now, any meaning for me beyond my momentary love of the music they were creating and the way they looked creating it.
The thrill, the inspiration of the moment was all there was. To capture a flickering moment of joyous experience and share it with others — that was the reason I began photographing in the first place, and that is still the reason I take pictures today. I was never a fan." – Elliott Landy, 1994
"For me, the joy of photography is the connection with what I am photographing and not the creation of an image with a computer. I try to do it in such a way that this joyous connection can be experienced by others who see my works." – Elliott Landy, 2018.
* The photo of Elliott used in this biography was taken by Bob Dylan.
