On Lisette Model
Adam Shatz | London Review of Books | 24th September 2026
Failing to make it as a professional musician, Austrian-born, Model left Europe for pre-war New York. There, she established herself as a street photographer. After her death, a large archive of images of jazz musicians and jazz clubs was discovered. Her “plainspoken” images, now seen as central to her output, capture a society rife with segregation and anti-communist fever. Said Model, “I was absolutely overwhelmed by jazz because I knew that was America”.