Edmund Rudolph Teske (March 7, 1911- Nov. 22, 1996); 20th-century American photographer who combined a career of taking portraits of artists, musicians and entertainers with a prolific output of experimental photography. His use of techniques like: combined prints, montages and solarizations led to "often romantic and mysterious images". Although he exhibited extensively and was well-known within artistic photography circles during his lifetime, his work was not widely known by the public. He has been called "one of the forgotten greats of American photography." Teske was born in Chicago, the eldest of 3 children born to Rudolph and Olga Teske. His parents were from Poland. When he was 8 years old his family moved to Wisconsin Rapids, Wisconsin, where they took up farming. During this period Teske developed his first artistic interests by experimenting with painting and poetry. In 1921 his family moved back to Chicago, and Teske began to study music, primarily the piano and saxophone. Two years later his grammar school teacher, Mabel Morehouse, introduced him to photography and let him develop his own photos in the school darkroom. For the next decade he spent most of his free time practicing both the piano and photography, and by 1932 he was accomplished enough in the piano that he became the protégé on concert pianist Ida Lustgarten. At the same time his photographic skills had advanced to the point that he was given his first one-man exhibition at the Blackstone Theatre in Chicago.... When World War II broke out, Teske was drafted for military duty, but he failed his medical exam for “asocial tendencies, psychoneurosis and emotional instability.” These were thought to have been medical code words to indicate his now growing sexual interests in other men. During this time he photographed 2 of his male co-workers nude while expressing his inner challenges in his journal: Strive to accept the facts of life... (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edmund_Teske) undefined

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