Helmut Newton needs no introduction. But we’ll give him one anyway. He was born Helmut Neustädter in Berlin in 1920 to a Jewish family. His father owned a button factory, which the Nazis took from him in the 1930s. After Kristallnacht, in 1938, Helmut’s parents fled to Argentina while he waited for his passport. Within a month, he was able to hop a ship to China, which ended up in Singapore; the authorities there sent him to Australia, where he enlisted in the army.
After the war, Neustädter returned to Melbourne, changed his surname to Newton, set up a photography studio, and married his life partner June Browne, an actress better known by her stage name, Alice Springs. Newton began shooting theater and fashion, and did industrial photography.