The Harry Warnecke Studio redefined magazine photography and brought life to American celebrity culture by adding a touch of color.

Up until the late 1930s colored images were basically unheard of and black-and-white photographs in magazines, newspapers, and tabloids were the norm. It was around this time that Harry Warnecke, a photojournalist at New York’s first tabloid, the New York Daily News, decided that monochrome was so last season! Warnecke urged the Daily News to develop a color photography studio where he could create richly colored portraits for the magazine. He argued that by including colored photographs of celebrities, the circulation and overall profit of the Daily News would certainly increase. This was enough to convince the big shots at the magazine and Warnecke was provided a new studio equipped with state-of-the art technology to get his venture started.

The Daily News color photography studio, commonly known as the Harry Warnecke Studio, was a small but extremely successful operation. Warnecke, along with his colleagues Robert F. Cranston and Gus Schoenbachler, used a laborious color photography process called tri-color carbro during which three negatives of the same image are simultaneously exposed through different colored filters. The result was groundbreaking and for the first time in history the American public could see their favorite celebrities in color! As the Daily News’ sales grew so did Warnecke’s reputation as a portrait photographer, and within just a few decades the Harry Warnecke Studio had photographed hundreds of American actors, athletes, musicians, and politicians. 

Despite his elite customer base Warnecke never became a celebrity himself. After Warnecke passed, his studio’s innovative work was stored at his widow’s house where it collected dust for almost ten years. It was not until 1992, when the Smithsonian National Portrait Gallery purchased their first Harry Warnecke Studio portrait that Warnecke’s impressive portfolio was rediscovered and brought back into the limelight. Now Warnecke and his team are rightfully known as photography pioneers who redesigned the magazine industry by bringing color into the daily lives of thousands of Americans.