Interview with Art Shay

Below, an interview Colin Asher conducted with photographer Art Shay. Colin’s article “Never a Lovely So Real,” an examination of the life and legacy of Nelson Algren, appears in this month’s issue and is online at believermag.com.

Art Shay has been a professional photographer for about twice as long as I have been alive. He was born in the Bronx, but made a name for himself in Chicago, where he has long been known as a masterful photojournalist and chronicler of “the downtrodden, on their way down or up.” He has, he estimates, taken about two million photographs; a hundred thousand keepers among them. Though he’s a nonagenarian, he wasn’t available for an interview when I first contacted him: too busy. He was preparing for a major retrospective at DRKRM, in Los Angeles; a new book is also in the works, and he has to keep up with his blog and some ongoing projects. Despite all the demands upon his time, Shay did agreed to carve out a few minutes to reminisce about Nelson Algren, a writer he met in 1949 and who later became a friend, and godfather to Shay’s first son. 

A hurricane disrupted our scheduled interview, and then there were technical difficulties. Game to the end, Shay agreed to correspond over email instead. The transcript of our exchange appears below. In it, Shay sings his own praises, defends his old friend against the charge that he was a drunk, quotes Algren’s three rules, and takes a shot at Adam Gopnik. It’s worth a read.

COLIN ASHER: I was hoping you could tell me about meeting Nelson Algren. If I have this right, you met in 1949. What was his reputation at the time? Did he live up to it?

ART SHAY: I met him as The Arm was coming out. He was a fine short story writer and liberal correspondent on all subjects in the mix. His letters to the Trib and Sun-Times were hilarious. I owned a couple of his books but hadn’t read them yet. I just knocked on his door at 1523 Wabansia. It was a one floor walk-up; $10 a month rent. He served tea, I showed him some of the stories I had done for Life and others. We hit it off well, then headed out to walk through his neighborhood, especially Milwaukee Ave and Halsted Street.

CA: He was near the height of his fame then and you were a younger man, not yet well known. How did he treat you? Was he condescending, or did he treat you as an...