Biography
Irving Albert Posluns was born in Toronto in 1924. His parents gave him a camera when he was a boy, and from the day he took and developed his first pictures in the 1940s, black and white photography was a craft he practised with devotion for the rest of his life.
A life in business
Irving earned his degree in Business from the University of Toronto and spent most of his working life in the fashion clothing industry. He founded Irving Posluns Sportswear, one of Canada’s leading makers of women’s outerwear, and co-founded Dylex Limited, where he served as Executive Vice President. Dylex, a public company in which the Posluns family were controlling shareholders, became one of Canada’s largest retailers, operating some 2,000 stores under banners such as Tip Top Tailors, Fairweather and Wet Seal.
A second career behind the camera
At 65, Irving closed his business and became a full-time photographer. He began with family and children’s black and white portraits, then spent the next 25 years travelling the world to photograph people in their own local, cultural and ecological surroundings: markets and temples, rice fields and river villages, from Burma, Nepal and Tibet to China, India, Bali and New Guinea.
His great creative and technical influence was Henri Cartier-Bresson, and it shows in the work: candid, unposed moments of everyday life, composed with a quiet, patient eye.
The archive
Every image was made the traditional way, on film. The negatives were later drum scanned at the highest possible resolution, producing files of up to 150 MB each, and none of the images has been retouched or digitally enhanced. Prints are made on archival paper using Piezography black and white printing to produce museum-quality reproductions. The collection numbers about 1,000 photographs, and Irving entrusted all of it, including the original negatives, to his son Joel before he passed away.
Exhibitions and giving
Irving’s photographs have been on permanent display at Baycrest Centre for Geriatric Care, and exhibited at the Ryerson University Gallery (now The Image Centre) and Toronto Western Hospital. Oxfam sponsored an exhibition of his work called Faces of the Global Village. He also donated tens of thousands of dollars’ worth of professional photographic equipment to the photography labs at Ryerson University, now Toronto Metropolitan University.
Irving Posluns passed away peacefully on November 10, 2020. He always hoped his photographs would live on after him. This archive is how his family is sharing them.