Documentary Books and Films:
Schoenfeld’s documentary photo books include Brittle Glory: The Face of Change (Turkey and Cuba), Almost Perfect (Vietnam) Awarded Best Book of 2004 by an Independent P...view moreDocumentary Books and Films:
Schoenfeld’s documentary photo books include Brittle Glory: The Face of Change (Turkey and Cuba), Almost Perfect (Vietnam) Awarded Best Book of 2004 by an Independent Publisher, Mission to India written by award winning veteran journalist Rex Weiner, Through This World But Once (Ethiopia), Footprints in the Sand with a foreword by Rev. Mpho Tutu and Everyday Heroes series honoring volunteer doctors from around the world. www.greatcirclebooks.com www.aandi.com/books
In 2008 Schoenfeld produced and directed the international film festival favorite, The Memory Box. Filmed entirely in Ethiopia. The landscape and the people of this exotic land are seen through the eyes of a Chaplinesque jester from Clowns Without Bodrers. The film challenges the cynical predictability of the tragedy of Africa.
In 2010 Schoenfeld’s television series “Everyday Heroes” was honored with two episodes, “Everyday is a Gift’ – filmed in South Africa and “In the Shadow of Shangri-La” – filmed in Nepal recognized as Outstanding TV Series Segments at the My Hero International Film Festival in Los Angeles. www.newdemocracyproductions.com
Art
“Schoenfeld takes pictures rather than photographs, his carefully orchestrated images appear, at a glance, like classic paintings”. International Herald Tribune, New York Times.
Schoenfeld is best know for his tableau vivants, including The Rape of the Sabine Women and Icons/Iconoclasts which have appeared in many publications including Harpers Bazarr and American Photo Magazine and.exhibited in galleries and museums in the United States, Canada, throughout Europe and Asia. Schoenfeld’s images are in the permanent collections of the National Museum of Contemporary Art (Seoul), Cirque du Soleil (Montreal), National Museum -Complesso del Vittoriano (Rome), County Arts Commission (Santa Barbara). Schoenfeld's "Icons/Iconoclasts" Suite begins a European Tour in Paris January 2010.
Schoenfeld’s figurative work has gained increasing recognition since his first published book of nudes in 2004 Surface Tension. International art critic, Peter Frank said Schoenfeld’s nude images are "Challenging photos... Images that treat the body simultaneously as sentient organism and as sculpture - voluptuously charged... These photos conjure Canova, Stieglitz, Dega and Modigliani –heroic.” Recent monograph books by Schoenfeld include: (French and English) Masques et Mystères (2009 Great Circle Books) and Masques et Mystères: Revisité (2010 Great Circle Books)
A Very Broad Background
Commenting that his background spans many fields of endeavor, Schoenfeld remembers once hearing it said that people should change careers every ten years. After ten years you're the best at what you do and should seek new challenges or if your not... all the more reason to seek new challenges. Schoenfeld notes, however, in photography I've found a passion that, everyday, presents new challenges. Schoenfeld is a licensed Commercial Airline Pilot, a licensed psychotherapist, a certified sex therapist and a certified scuba diver.
Trained as a psychologist, in 1973, Schoenfeld was the co-founder and Director of the Los Angeles Guidance and Counseling Service; by 1978 the tax-exempt non-profit LAGCS was one of the largest providers of outpatient mental health services in the state of California.
1979-1995 CEO and Chairman of Air L.A. Inc., the first airline in the United States to fly under an international code sharing partnership. In 1994 the airline expanded after a successful NASDAQ public offering.
1996-2002 - CEO and Chairman of Real Image Digital, a motion picture technology partnership with the Sarnoff Research Center. In 2002 RID was sold to Technicolor.
2003- Current - Chairman of the Board of Directors, Great Circle Books. GCB was organized to publish works of social and humanitarian consequence. The funds raised through the sale of books are designated to support a number of charities and humanitarian projects.
2009 - Current - Director, New Democracy Productions, producer of award documentary films and television series. www.newdemocracyproductions.com
Schoenfeld is a member of the Circumnavigators Club. He is on the Photographic Arts Council of the Los Angeles County Museum of Art and the Santa Barbara County Museum of Art.view less