Dutch Photographers since 1938

Kandó, Ata

• 
  Ata Kandó / Nederlands Fotomuseum, Hongaarse vluchtelingen in het grensgebied van Oostenrijk en Hongarije (1956)
• 
  Ed van der Elsken / Nederlands Fotomuseum, Fotografe Ata Kandó bekijkt een foto bij een lamp, Parijs, Frankrijk (1953)

Name variations

 

Family relationships

 

Short description

Ata Kandó came from a family of intellectuals. She trained at the Bortnyik School, a private art school in Budapest where she met her first husband, the painter Gyula Kandó. Until the outbreak of World War Two she worked as a children's more... »

Ata Kandó came from a family of intellectuals. She trained at the Bortnyik School, a private art school in Budapest where she met her first husband, the painter Gyula Kandó. Until the outbreak of World War Two she worked as a children's photographer, but hardly anything of this prewar work has survived. After spending time in Paris and Barcelona, she decided to settle in the French capital in 1947. In 1950, by which time she was divorced from Gyula, she met the young Dutch photographer Ed van der Elsken. In 1954 the two were married and returned to the Netherlands. This marriage, too, was shortlived; in 1955 they decided to go their separate ways.
Ata Kandó's work can be roughly divided into her time in Paris, the period in which she lived and worked in the Netherlands, and her Latin-American photographs. After the war she worked for Paris fashion houses and continued to do so after accompanying Ed van der Elsken to the Netherlands. In 1956 she and Violette Cornelius collaborated on a book about Hungarian refugees. A year later the book Droom in het woud (Dream in the forest) appeared, a photographic fantasy starring her children. Ulysse, another photo-book featuring her children, was never published, although many of the photographs did appear in magazines and catalogues. In 1961 she went on a trip through the Amazon region at the invitation of a Parisian mannequin who was married to an Indian assistant of Le Corbusier. She became fascinated by the Amazonian Indians and returned to the area in 1965 for a lengthier stay. Exhibitions and publications featuring her photographs played a significant part in informing the world about the destruction of the Amazonian Indians and their culture.
Ata Kandó also played an important role as a teacher of photography at the School of Graphic Arts in Utrecht and the AKI in Enschede. Her pupils included Koen Wessing and Ad van Denderen. « less...

Place/date of birth

Boedapest 1913-09-17 

Place/date of death

 

Nationality

Hongaars, Nederlands 

Qualification

fotograaf 

Subject

reisfotografie, documentaire fotografie, reportagefotografie, modefotografie, autonome fotografie
 

Product

fotoboeken  

Material

 

Collection is managed by

 

Copyright is managed by

 

Other websites about this photographer

 

 

Go to this photographer in RKD-Artists 

Latest editing

2011-11-17 (el) 

Books

• Droom in het woud. Kando, Thomas 1957
• Slaaf of Dood Kando, Ata 1970
• Kalypso & Nausikaä Homerus 2004
• Ata Kando, photographer Denderen, Ad van, Erken, Leo, Hollak, Rosan 2008
• Ata Kando; Édes hazám, Isten veled! 1999

Places/periods of working

Boedapest
Parijs
Nederland
Amazoneregenwoud (landstreek)
 

Publications

 

Education

 

Pupil of

 

Teacher of

 

Winner of

 

Member of

GKf beroepsvereniging van fotografen 

See also

  

Sources

 

Additional remarks