Portrait photographer Yousuf Karsh dies at 93

Photographer Yousuf Karsh, who gained international prominence with his 1941 portrait of a defiant Winston Churchill and photos of public figures such as Albert Einstein and Ernest Hemingway, has died in the US at the age of 93.

Karsh died yesterday at Brigham and Women’s Hospital, in Boston said hospital spokeswoman Jacqui Fowler. His European agent, Roger Eldridge, said Karsh died of complications following surgery.

Karsh’s subjects included many world leaders, artists and other celebrities.

‘‘My personal interest in ordinary people is unlimited, but I am fascinated by the challenge of portraying true greatness adequately with my camera,’’ he wrote in a 1996 essay published in Contemporary Photographers.

His photographs are included in permanent collections ranging from the Museum of Modern Art in New York to the National Portrait Gallery in London.

‘‘When you look for one picture to sum somebody up, it’s always his picture you’d pick,’’ Mr Eldridge said. ‘‘Inevitably, he’d take the definitive portrait of the people of the age.’’

He was catapulted to international fame with his 1941 portrait of Churchill, taken as Britain stood alone against Nazi Germany.

The photo of a defiant Churchill ‘‘appealed to the whole world’’, Karsh said in an interview with The Associated Press in 1989. ‘‘It caught all the bulldog determination of the British Empire. It was done without premeditation but with great admiration and respect.’’

Karsh’s 1957 photo of Hemingway wearing a turtleneck sweater was the basis of a commemorative US stamp honouring the acclaimed writer.

Karsh also took portraits of the late Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev, Mikhail Gorbachev, a young Fidel Castro and film stars like Audrey Hepburn, Brigitte Bardot and Humphrey Bogart.

‘‘He was able to see what was real in people and put it on film, whether it was your president or your mother or father,’’ said Jerry Fielder, Karsh’s curator and former assistant.

Karsh was born to an Armenian family in Turkey, but fled after massacres in his home town of Mardin. He arrived in Canada in 1924.

He originally planned to become a doctor, but studied under Boston portrait photographer John H Garo, and in 1932 opened his first photography studio in Ottawa, Canada.

Although he was trained to use only available light, his involvement with a theatre company in Ottawa taught him the importance of using studio lighting to create a mood.

‘‘The human face is the great challenge in the world,’’ Karsh said. ‘‘I never tire of it, and everyone is different.’’

Karsh moved to Boston in the early 1990s.

His first wife, Solange Gauthier, died in 1961. He is survived by his second wife, Estrellita Maria Nachbar.

A private funeral will be held in Ottawa and a memorial service will be held at a later date.