Larence (sometimes Lawrence) Nathan Shustak (LNS) was born in New York City on 13th February, 1926. He grew up in New Jersey with his father (Henry), his mother (Pearl) his brother (Ray) & his sister (Sarah). He left school at the age of 15 and entered an apprenticeship in tool-making. It was during these years that he took evening classes in Philosophy. In 1944 he enlisted in the US Army and he was assigned to the 774th Tank Battalion in Germany. He remained in Germany when the war ended and became an interpreter, translating military documents and letters and assisting war crime lawyers in questioning prisoners for information.

Following his discharge from the Army in 1946, he returned to working as tool and dye maker at various companies in New Jersey and New York City until 1950.

In 1951 he spent the year in Europe, financed by gathering soil samples for the Pfizer Co. It was during this year that he began to become very interested in photography. Some of this work would become part of the group show Photography in the Fine Arts at the Metropolitan Museum in New York City in 1962.

On his return to the U.S.A in 1952, he started photographing Off Broadway shows, actors portraits and frequently stories for magazines. By 1955 he had his own studio and was mostly shooting record jackets, but also book covers, photographic illustrations, brochures and annual reports. Shustak's reason for photographing record jackets was so he could go to the recording sessions.

Between 1955-1958 Shustak became serious about his work as a photographer and began to use photography as a means of personal expression. He attended workshops with Eugene Smith, Nathan Lyons, David Vestal and others.

Around 1958, Shustak had a portfolio in Modern Photographyin the “Discovery” section where the work of new photographers was published.

In 1960, Shustak received the Art Director's Club Award for a record jacket and the American Institute of Graphic Arts Award for the illustration of a story about Cannonball Adderly.

1961 and Shustak had a one-man show at the Village Camera Club in New York and another at the University of Minnesota Art Gallery. Around this time, another portfolio of Shustak's work was published in the Popular Photography Annual.

In 1962, lee Lockwood received a group show at the New School in Contemporary Photography and in that same year Shustak's work was a part of Photography in the Fine Arts II at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, plus a group show at New York University.

Between 1960-1964, Shustak gave private classes in printing technique and from 1963-1966 he taught courses in the aesthetics and history of photoraphphy and photographic printing at the Educational Alliance in New York.

1. Ordered List Item
2. Cracow Jazz Club, Poland.
3. Gallery of Provincetown, Mass.
4. Carl Siembab Gallery, Boston, Mass.

Shustak was also represented in Photography in the Fine Arts III at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Newsreel footage for French TV with William Klein. Associate editor of Contemporary Photographer with Lee Lockwood

Film for Seventeen Magazine About the day in the life of a young model. Portfolios in the German magazine Twen and Camera 35 Extensive photgraphic mosaic on the South-east Bronx and its social environment, commissioned by the Albert Einstein Institute to supplement a metal health research study.

• A blog entry about L.N.Shustak
• Shustak My Space Page.