Art Kane’s Back Pages: See the Photographer’s Legendary Shots

Photographer Art Kane wasn't one to get overly impressed by the stars he was shooting. "When Art Kane took our picture, he told us, 'Go there, do this, do that, be asleep, put your head on his shoulder,' " Pete Townshend said of the iconic 1968 photo of the Who asleep under a Union Jack. "We like that kind of direction." The picture is a highlight of a new collection of Kane's work, Art Kane, full of stunning images of Bob Dylan, Cream and the Stones, alongside figures like Lenny Bruce and Ali McGraw. Kane, who came to prominence with a 1958 photo of 57 jazz musicians standing in front of a Harlem brownstone, remained prolific until his death in 1995. The kinds of shots you won't see are pictures of artists in concert, which Kane found stagey and contrived. "His thing was grabbing the subject and creating a personal statement about them," says Jonathan Kane, the photographer's son and a founding member of the New York noise-rock band Swans. "It's not shooting the musician or the artist doing their thing. It's shooting them doing his thing."