Howard Schatz

Howard Schatz (born 1940) is an American ophthalmologist and photographer. After an academic career as a retina specialist, primarily in the San Francisco area, he turned his photography hobby into a successful second career. Schatz's photographs are exhibited in museums and photography galleries internationally and are included in innumerable private collections. He has received international acclaim for his work.

Schatz completed his medical degree at The University of Illinois College of Medicine, followed by an internship at Cook County Hospital in Chicago, ophthalmology residency at The University of Illinois Eye and Ear Infirmary, and fellowship in vitreoretinal diseases at Johns Hopkins Hospital. He was also a specialist in medical retina based in San Francisco, California.

Schatz has had seventeen monographs published of his photographs. H2O (2007), is the third in his series of explorations of imagery made on, over and underwater. Schatz first established a following for this uniquely expressionistic underwater imagery in the 1990s with two collections of underwater photography, Water Dance and Pool Light.

In In Character: Actors Acting (2006), Schatz's sixteenth book of photographs, he photographed 100 actors of stage, screen and television, directing them in one-on-one improvisation.

Schatz's editorial work has been published in Time, Sports Illustrated, Vogue, Vogue Italia, GQ Italia, The New York Times Magazine, The New Yorker, Stern, Life, Black/White, American Photo, Photo France, and Photo Italia. His work has been featured on the Today Show, Good Morning America, NPR, Fox Sports Network, and the Discovery Channel.

He has made underwater images for advertising clients, namely Brizo (a Delta Faucet Company brand), Sensei, Coca-Cola/Sprite, Ralph Lauren RLX, Escada, Sergio Tacchini, Nike, Reebok, Wolford, Etienne Aigner, Sony, Adidas, Finlandia Vodka, MGM Grand Hotel, Virgin Records, and Mercedes-Benz.

As Howard Schatz and Beverly Ornstein

• 1992: Gifted Woman
• 1993: Seeing Red: The Rapture of Redheads
• 1994: Homeless: Portraits of Americans in Hard Times
• 1995: Newborn
• 1995: WaterDance
• 1996: The Princess of the Spring and the Queen of the Sea
• 1996: BodyType
• 1997: Passion & Line
• 1998: Pool Light
• 2000: Bodyknots
• 2000: NudeBodyNude
• 2002: Rare Creatures
• 2002: Athlete
• 2005: Botanica
• 2006: In Character: Actors Acting
• 2007: H2O
• 2011: With Child
• 2012: At The Fights
• 2013: Caught In The Act: Actors Acting

With others

• 1996: Virtuoso. 1996. By Ken Carbone with photographs by Schatz.