Iceland review - 2016, Qupperneq 68

66 ICELAND REVIEW
LAST CENTURY’S
PICTURE MAN
For fifty years, photojournalist Ólafur K. Magnússon (1926-1997)
was on the frontline of Icelandic photography as a staff
photographer for daily newspaper Morgunblaðið.
BY PÁLL STEFÁNSSON. PHOTOS BY ÓLAFUR K. MAGNÚSSON.
He was not only a great pho-
tographer, but also a great
teacher and storyteller,” says
photographer RAX (Ragnar Axelsson)
of his late colleague, Ólafur K.
Magnússon, with whom he worked for
over two decades. “He was also the best
journalist I have worked with; he had a
great nose for news.”
Born in Reykjavík in 1926, Ólafur
was the youngest of five sons of Guðný
Kristín Hafliðadóttir and her husband,
sea captain Magnús K. Jóhannesson,
who went down with his ship, Jón
Forseti, in 1928.
In 1944, Ólafur went to the US to be
a pilot, before turning to photography
studies in New York and Los Angeles.
Soon after coming home, he started at
daily newspaper Morgunblaðið in 1947,
and was there until he retired at the
age of 70 in 1996. The following year,
he passed away.
Ólafur was held in high esteem by
colleagues, as commercial and art
photographer Guðmundur Ingólfsson
explains: “When I had been working
for a while as a photographer, in the
early 1970s, I sometimes ran into Óli
K. (as he was called) on assignments. By
that time, the number of photographers
had increased greatly, and sometimes
colleagues from abroad were on the
scene. But there was never any doubt
about who the Grand Old Man among
us was.”
Like so many photographers, Ólafur
did not take the time to catalogue his
work. But Morgunblaðið has completed
the process, making his images accessi-
ble on its website.
A book of his best images is in
the works by historian Anna Dröfn
Ágústsdóttir. Covering Óli K.’s life
and work, the book will present the
best documentation of Iceland and
Icelanders in the second part of the last
century. *

Two masters: photographer Ólafur K. Magnússon, left, and master painter Jóhannes Kjarval.