Article

Sam Bejan Tata

Published Online March 23, 2009

Last Edited March 4, 2015

Sam Bejan Tata, photojournalist, portrait photographer (b at Shanghai, China 30 Sept 1911; d at Sooke, B.C. 3 July 2005). He immigrated to Canada in 1956. An unobtrusive but lively personality permitted him to witness discreetly

Tata, Sam Bejan

 Sam Bejan Tata, photojournalist, portrait photographer (b at Shanghai, China 30 Sept 1911; d at Sooke, B.C. 3 July 2005). He immigrated to Canada in 1956. An unobtrusive but lively personality permitted him to witness discreetly the events surrounding the 1949 Chinese Revolution. His extraordinary work recorded life on the streets and in the courts of Shanghai in 1948; in India, he had seen the photographs of Henri Cartier-Bresson and found his approach to photography radically altered. Tata's portraits of Canadian artists, writers, poets and photographers are an important contribution to Canadian history and photography. In 1982 he received an honorary degree from Concordia University, and in 1989 he was the subject of a retrospective exhibition at the CANADIAN MUSEUM OF CONTEMPORARY PHOTOGRAPHY.