Marc Karzen /// Photo Bio
MARC KARZEN was born in Paris and raised between Louisville KY and Los Angeles. Karzen’s photographic career grew out of Kodachrome freestyle, straight environmental social reportage, magazine fashion photography, music portraiture — and into the unique area of on-air photography for television.
Karzen has shot for European publications including Harpers & Queen, Depeche Mode, Company, 20ans, Marie France, Votre Beauté, Marie Claire — until moving back to the states. In NYC, he shot for Rolling Stone, Glamour, GQ, Mademoiselle, WWD, Seventeen, Fortune, Los Angeles Times, New York Times, international syndication with Outline Press Images and Gamma Liaison — plus shoots for ad agencies and record labels. In television, Karzen shot for Saturday Night Live, Late Night with David Letterman and he has won awards and has shown in gallery exhibitions.
Karzen’s photographs show his passion for order and space through use of powerful colors, textures and design. The Italian photo art review, Il Fotografo, stated, “From Karzen's images, the strong colors spread on wide surfaces distributed with a rigorous graphic equilibrium, broken at times by a point of attention, a face or unpredicted object, one notices a cultural background where modern painting and cinematography merge. There are bodies, architecture, and urban landscapes dominated by bright, sometimes violent light, which is almost that of the sun.” As the elements of his training can easily be seen in his bold, rich lines of color and forms that inhabit his work. Karzen has said, “My images succeed only when the strength of form, surpasses subject, by defining the relationship of shape to color”.
Karzen returned to his birthplace of Paris for a semester abroad — dropping out of the Sorbonne — where he jump started his career as a magazine photographer — where the enriched cultures of Paris, London and Milan contributed to his creative growth.
Karzen was brought to the opening of the Pompidou Centre by French abstract artist Jean Miotte — which began his personal journey, combing the floors of 'Beaubourg' over the next 3-years, devouring the works of Mondrian, Kandinsky, Bacon, Picasso, van Gogh, Matisse, Magritte, Stella and Man Ray. As well, in Paris, Karzen's photographic influences were Guy Bourdin, Lee Friedlander, Mary Ellen Mark, Antonin Kratochvil, Jean Pagliuso, Helmet Newton and Steve Hiett — in New York, Richard Avedon and his studio team, Cornell Capa at the ICP — and in LA, Ruscha and Hockney.
In New York, Marc was asked at a moment’s notice, to shoot photo-animated stills of the SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE logo written in wet cement in front of 30 Rockefeller Plaza for the SNL main title sequence. This led to 12 seasons shooting interstitial photographs used on-air for segment titles, interstitials, faux-commercials, set backgrounds and props.
In 1982 as NBC'S LATE NIGHT WITH DAVID LETTERMAN sought a distinctive look to brand and ID the show. Karzen along with art director Bob Pook and graphics coordinator Edd Hall, created the Emmy nominated ‘No-Logo’ concept where the show title was integrated into natural late night New York settings. These iconic ‘bumper’ images aired before and after commercials. Karzen shot hundreds of scenes all over New York over 11 years for Letterman. The original work is all pre-digital with in-camera props and as well as hand collage graphics on the original c-prints, now available as a book. LINK
His educational background moved across mediums — from photography at Santa Monica College with 4x5 and the zone system, to architecture and graphic design at the University of Louisville — to art history at the Sorbonne. In Los Angeles, Karzen studied, and then taught workshops for The American Film Institute and studied screenwriting at UCLA Extensions. Currently, Karzen is a regular speaker at university film schools.
Karzen also co-produced the award winning documentary ON ASSIGNMENT for PBS covering photojournalists Alfred Eisenstadt, David Burnett, Jodie Cobb and Jay Mather.
Karzen's LATE NIGHT work was nominated for the Emmy (Graphic Design and Title Sequences), contributed to 5 Emmy awards, 30+ Emmy nominations, Broadcast Designers Association-Gold, the Art Directors Club of NY, NY International Film & Television Awards, Cannes International Advertising Festival and Chicago Film Festival.