(bĕr´enēs´) , 1898-1991, American photographer, b. Springfield, Ohio. Abbott turned from sculpture to photography in 1923. She was assistant to Man Ray in Paris (1923-25), where she made an extraordinary series of portraits of the artistic and literary celebrities of the 1920s. She began her great documentation of New York City in 1929; many of the best photographs were collected in her book Changing New York (1939). In 1958, she produced a stunningly beautiful set of photographs for a high-school physics text that some critics consider her finest work. She discovered the work of Eugène Atget in 1925 and labored successfully to secure him international recognition.
