{"id":106305,"date":"2026-01-20T20:37:13","date_gmt":"2026-01-20T20:37:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/106305\/"},"modified":"2026-01-20T20:37:13","modified_gmt":"2026-01-20T20:37:13","slug":"see-lifes-best-on-display-in-new-york","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/106305\/","title":{"rendered":"See LIFE’s Best On Display in New York"},"content":{"rendered":"

Though February 21, 2026 the Staley Wise Gallery in New York City<\/a> is running a show called \u201cLooking at LIFE<\/a>,\u201d which features some of the most popular photos from the history of the magazine.<\/p>\n

In this brief interview the gallery\u2019s director, George Kocis, explains how the show came together. <\/p>\n

LIFE: How did you select\u00a0which photos would appear in this show?<\/p>\n

GEORGE KOCIS: We made print-outs of every single photograph available from the LIFE archive \u2013 over 600 images! \u00a0We also considered images by photographers Harry Benson, Abe Frajndlich, and William Helburn, who we work with directly and whose work appeared in the magazine. \u00a0From this, we chose 75 or so of our favorites, and pretty quickly discovered thematic groups and stories that we could tell and which would inform the physical design of the exhibition. It was our privilege\u00a0to have access to such a vast body of work, but painful to not include everything that we wanted due to space constraints!<\/p>\n

LIFE: What would you describe as the distinctive appeal of the LIFE brand of photography?<\/p>\n

GK: LIFE was particularly great at reflecting the \u201creal life\u201d of its readers right alongside images of aspiration and glamour. \u00a0Our exhibition includes this kind of diversity as well\u00a0\u2013 we have photographs\u00a0of baseball fans in Brooklyn<\/a>,\u00a0oil field workers in Texas<\/a>, and\u00a0World War II soldiers saying goodbye to their wives at Penn Station<\/a>\u00a0\u2013 but also photographs\u00a0of Al Pacino and Diane Keaton shooting \u201cThe Godfather\u201d<\/a>,\u00a0Princess Margaret\u2019s wedding<\/a>, and\u00a0Grace Kelly and Audrey Hepburn at the Academy Awards<\/a>. \u00a0There are even pictures that combine those perspectives, such as Peter Stackpole\u2019s 1947 photograph\u00a0of actor Jimmy Stewart in his Colonel\u2019s uniform<\/a>\u00a0at his father\u2019s hardware store in Pennsylvania when he left Hollywood to enlist in the Army Air Corps.<\/p>\n

LIFE: The show has been up since December. What kind of reactions have you had from visitors?<\/p>\n

GK: Many visitors to the exhibition have said that they remember waiting for LIFE magazine to arrive in the mail each week! We\u2019ve also had a few editors that worked for the magazine and people currently and formerly in the publishing industry come to see the exhibition and that\u2019s been very interesting to hear their perspective and experience. \u00a0Younger visitors don\u2019t share that nostalgia, of course . . . they\u2019re as familiar with the brand of \u201cLIFE\u201d as they are with McDonald\u2019s and Nike, but they have rarely seen the magazine or these images before.<\/p>\n

LIFE: Are there particular images in the show that stand out to you as remarkable,\u00a0or that exemplify LIFE\u2019s appeal?
There\u2019s hardly a more iconic image than the \u201cVJ-Day Kiss<\/a>\u201d by Alfred Eisenstaedt, which has been a well-known symbol of patriotism and joy since it was taken in 1945 but which has also more recently been parodied by the Simpsons and\u00a0inspired contemporary painter Amy Sherald<\/a>. \u00a0LIFE\u2019s photographers also had the opportunity to highlight an outsider\u2019s perspective of the familiar, which is why Leonard McCombe\u2019s\u00a0picture of men enjoying some ice cream in Iowa<\/a>\u00a0is unexpectedly poignant \u2013 as a Brit who recently obtained his US citizenship, McCombe noted that \u201cI began to notice the difference in my own countrymen. \u00a0I\u2019d never even seen men eating ice cream (that was only a children\u2019s treat in England). But by now . . . I feel I am a citizen of the place where I belong\u201d. My personal favorite in the exhibition might be John Dominis\u2019 photograph\u00a0of a priest ice skating<\/a>\u00a0\u2013 another great union of a familiar subject in an unexpected context.<\/p>\n

LIFE: What has your gallery done to display these photos in a way that gives their historical context?
GK: In addition to the photographs themselves, the exhibition includes scans from the actual pages of LIFE magazine with corresponding anecdotes about some of the photographers and the images \u2013 most of which are included on\u00a0our website<\/a>, too. \u00a0This collection of work is informative and educational \u2013 and also entertaining and simply fun to see! \u00a0We hope that visitors will enjoy each of these photographer\u2019s contributions to LIFE magazine and recognize these images\u2019 historical and cultural significance. Staley-Wise Gallery has always celebrated photography that has appeared primarily in magazines, and this exhibition continues that tradition. \u00a0<\/p>\n

Below are a selection of images from the show.<\/p>\n

\""Eyes\""Eyes<\/p>\n

\u201cEyes right\u201d is executed with near-military precision by men aboard a New York-bound 20th Century Limited train as movie star Kim Novak eases into her seat in the dining car. Originally published in the March 5, 1956, issue of LIFE.<\/p>\n

Leonard McCombe\/Life Picture Collecltion\/Shutterstock<\/p>\n

\"World\"World<\/p>\n

Brooklyn went wild after the Dodgers\u2019 win in 1955.<\/p>\n

Photo by Martha Holmes\/The LIFE Picture Collection\/Shuttetrstock<\/p>\n

\"\"\"\"\/<\/p>\n

Steve McQueen is seen driving a sleek and stylish sports car on the streets of Los Angeles, California in June 1963.<\/p>\n

John Dominis \/ LIFE Picture Collection \/Shutterstock<\/p>\n

\"Jackson\"Jackson<\/p>\n

Jackson Pollock worked in his Long Island studio, 1949.<\/p>\n

Martha Holmes\/Life Pictures\/Shutterstock<\/p>\n

\"Natalie\"Natalie<\/p>\n

Natalie Wood and Warren Beatty, Cannes, 1962.<\/p>\n

Paul Schutzer The LIFE Picture Collection\/Shutterstock<\/p>\n

\"5\"5<\/p>\n

Models posed a race track betting window at Roosevelt Raceway., New York.<\/p>\n

Nina Leen\/The LIFE Picture Collection\/Shutterstock<\/p>\n

\"Little\"Little<\/p>\n

Little League 1954<\/p>\n

Yale Joel\/Life Pictures\/Shutterstock<\/p>\n

\"A\"A<\/p>\n

Eisenstaedt\u2019s iconic photo: A jubilant American sailor clutched a dental assistant in a back-bending kiss at a moment of spontaneous joy about the long awaited WWII victory over Japan. Taken on V-J Day, 1945, as thousands jammed Times Square. In recent decades this iconic photograph has engendered condemnation, after Greta Zimmer Friedman, the woman being kissed by the sailor (believed to have been George Mendonsa) said that the kiss was nonconsensual. In 2019, shortly after Mendonsa died at age 95, a statue of the kiss in Florida was tagged with #metoo graffiti.<\/p>\n

Alfred Eisenstaedt The LIFE Picture Collection\/Shutterstock<\/p>\n

\"Jimmy\"Jimmy<\/p>\n

While his father chatted with a customer at the hardware store, a uniformed Jimmy Stewart set up a date to go fishing, 1945.<\/p>\n

Peter Stackpole\/Life Pictures\/Shutterstock<\/p>\n

\"Watching\"Watching<\/p>\n

Watching Bwana Devil in 3-D at the Paramount Theater, 1952<\/p>\n

J.R. Eyerman The LIFE Picture Collection\/Shutterstock<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Though February 21, 2026 the Staley Wise Gallery in New York City is running a show called \u201cLooking…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":106306,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[48113,3443,48114,9,11,10,48115],"class_list":{"0":"post-106305","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-new-york","8":"tag-classic-life-photos","9":"tag-life","10":"tag-life-magazine","11":"tag-new-york","12":"tag-new-york-headlines","13":"tag-new-york-news","14":"tag-staley-wise"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/106305","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=106305"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/106305\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/106306"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=106305"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=106305"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=106305"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}