Kenn Duncan is widely considered to be one of the foremost dance photographers of the late 20th Century. In addition to his work as principal photographer for After Dark and Dance Magazine, his photos also appeared in Vogue, Time, Life, Newsweek and Harper’s Bazaar. From the mid-1960’s through the early 1980’s, he photographed nearly every major dance company in the world as well as many Broadway shows.
Born in New Jersey on September 22, 1928, Duncan began his career as a figure skater and then segued into dance. His career took another turn when he was sidelined with a broken foot and signed up for a six-week photography course at the local YMCA. Naturally he gravitated back to the dance world for photographic inspiration.
In addition to his dance photography, Duncan was well regarded for his nude photographs, with an emphasis on male subjects. His first two books, Nudes (1970) and More Nudes (1971) were favorably received for his “discreet and artistic arrangements of his subjects.”
After Dark was an edgy entertainment and culture-based magazine that sprang from the waning Ballroom Dance Magazine in 1968. In The Rise And Fall Of Gay Culture, Daniel Harris writes; “One of the strangest reincarnations in journalistic history… it was out of the ashes of a periodical devoted to such topics as waltzes, rumbas, and turkey trots that After Dark, an audacious mass-market experiment in gay eroticism, arose like a phoenix in all of its subversive splendor.”
Although After Dark was not officially a gay magazine, the publishers were certainly willing to cater to that audience, pushing the envelope on male nudity to a degree that is still not seen in mainstream US publications 50 years later.
Richard Thomas (1969)
Sal Mineo (1971)
Duncan photographed Bette Midler numerous times through the years, including three After Dark cover photos and the cover shot for her 1976 Live At Last LP.
In 1971, Kenn Duncan photographed singer Lou Christie for his Paint America Love LP.
Harvey Evans was photographed in the buff for the October, 1971 cover of After Dark to promote the television adaption of the musical Dames At Sea.
Tony award-winning Welsh actor/director Roger Rees in several undated photos.
Brad Davis (1981)
Maxwell Caulfield (1981)
After Dark shuttered in early 1983. The following year, Duncan published The Red Shoes, a photo book featuring celebrities wearing red shoes in a nod to both the Hans Christian Anderson fairy tale as well as the ruby slippers of The Wizard of Oz. Among those featured were many familiar subjects of his earlier work, including (pictured below) Brad Davis, Bette Midler, Maxwell Caulfield, Eartha Kitt, Dick Cavett, Mikhail Baryshnikov, John Curry, Richard Thomas, Gregory Hines, and Treat Williams.
Duncan began work on a second Red Shoes book, but it remained unfinished, along with several other projects. He was just 57 years old when he died of AIDS complications at New York Hospital on July 27, 1986. In 2003, the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts acquired 600,000 photos from Kenn Duncan’s estate. Many of these photos have been digitized and are now available for viewing online for free.
See also:
Don Herron’s Tub Shots
The Yale Posture Photos: Bill Hinnant
The Yale Posture Photos: James Franciscus
Revisiting Bette Midler’s Thighs & Whispers (1979)
Gay Times #69 (1978)
John Waters in Blueboy Magazine (1977)
Fire Island PaJaMa Party
Artist’s Muse: José “Pete” Martinez
Artist’s Muse: The Mystery Model
Artist’s Muse: William Weslow
Artist’s Muse: Randy Jack
Buddy & Johnny: A Historic Photo Shoot
Brian Ferrari's Blog 
7 thoughts on “Kenn Duncan After Dark”