Recording the Light

Anyone with children involved in sports in the Palisades has likely met or heard about Rick Steil. He is an assistant coach in the Palisades Pony Baseball Association and volunteers as a Rec Center basketball and flag football coach for his two sons, Tucker and Tyler. Watching him in action, it’s clear he understands the intricacies of the sports he’s involved in, yet he chooses to take a secondary role. Not that he wouldn’t embrace the opportunity to be a head coach, it’s just that in his line of work he must be prepared to leave for weeks at a time at the click of a camera. You see, Steil is a freelance fashion photographer who spends much of his time on photo shoots far away from the Palisades. Steil’s sports knowledge harkens back to his childhood in Dubuque, Iowa, where he lettered all four years in four different sports’ football, basketball, baseball, and track. Although he was recruited by colleges throughout the Midwest for sports, he also won an arts scholarship. When he was a sophomore, he took a beginning photography course with teacher Chuck Renfrow. “Whenever I was off sports,” Steil said, “I’d do photography.” Renfrow thought he had talent and helped Steil pursue photography through independent study. Renfrow persuaded Steil to enter Iowa State’s Art Competition with his photos. Out of the entire state, he was one of the 30 applicants who got an interview, and from there, he was one of only four who was selected to receive a full four-year tuition scholarship.”It’s ironic I won. I never felt like I was artistic,” he said.”I’m a recorder. I don’t create.” Steil went to the University of Dubuque, where he was the starting quarterback for four years. Looking back, Steil is philosophical about his high school and college athletic days. “When you’ve played sports, it’s like a small shot of your life,” he said. “I see it now when I coach. It’s like some dads try to live through their sons, but there’s so much more in life.” After earning his B.A. in marketing, he went to Brooks Institute in Santa Barbara for photography. He graduated in January 1983 and moved to New York City with only a camera and his dad’s army duffel bag filled with clothes. He didn’t have any money, knew no one and didn’t have a place to live. Eventually he found a two-bedroom apartment in Stuyvesant Town on 23rd, between first and the East River that he shared with another man. The man’s wife worked in Princeton and their daughter had graduated. The man would give Steil a blank check to go grocery shopping as long as he cooked enough food to ensure there were leftovers. Steil interviewed with photographer Hal Davis, who shot ads for Benson & Hedges, Johnny Walker and Revlon. Davis asked two questions: where are you from and from what school did you graduate? After Steil answered the questions, Davis hired him on the spot. Later Davis explained that since Steil had graduated from Brooks, he knew he had the right technical background, but more importantly, since he was from Iowa, he knew Steil had worked during his life and would work hard. Steil worked two years as Davis’s assistant, before he took time off to travel in Europe with a friend. They spent six months in 14 countries and were living in Portugal in a two-bedroom apartment overlooking the ocean for six dollars a day, when they started to run out of money. Steil happened to speak to his former employer and found out that Davis had just landed a job for Nivea which included shooting the beaches of Portugal. Davis rehired Steil, which allowed him to live in Europer longer. He met and fell in love with a girl in Madrid, but eventually money became an issue once again. Steil flew back to New York and did some freelance work and then went back to Paris and his girlfriend. The relationship eventually fell apart, but during that time, he starting working as an assistant for Mike Reinhardt, a major fashion photographer. “We traveled to Paris, Milan, the Caribbean, Tahiti; we stayed in five-star hotels, ate the best food and were surrounded by beautiful girls.” Steil said. “And I got paid to do it. I still have to pinch myself.” After working for Reinhardt for almost two years, Steil went back to Paris to establish himself by shooting model portfolios for agencies. After doing that for almost a year and a half, he got a chance call from the son of the publisher of “Australian Mode” magazine who was in London and needed a photographer. Steil was the only one he knew. Having never seen the magazine before, Steil had no idea of the kind of shot they needed. To make matters more complicated it was the summer and most of the models had already gone to the beaches in the south of France for the weekend. He found a six-foot-tall Swedish Marilyn Monroe look-alike who couldn’t speak a word of English, and photographed her. To his surprise, not only did the magazine use every single photo, but promised him work if he ever came to Australia. He immediately moved and spent the next seven months in Sydney. About a month before he returned to the United States, he started dreaming every night about Nicole Fitzgerald, an American model he had met in Paris. He was friends with her, but they had never even kissed. “I knew I was going to marry her,” he said. As soon as he landed he called her. They were married in January 1993 and moved to the Palisades. “Within six months, I had a wife, a baby on the way and a mortgage,” Steil said. “I knew then life would never be simple again.” Steil has photographed top models and actresses like Cameron Diaz. He’s worked as a free-lance photographer for Nordstrom, Eddie Bauer, L.A.Times, Ocean Pacific and Pendleton. With his background in sports, I wondered why he never pursued that area of photography. “I’ve never really taken sports photos,” he said. “When you shoot you isolate on one action, and I like looking at the whole arena.” What makes his photography distinct? “I’m known for beautiful lighting,” he said. “I enjoy shooting light; the way it hits people and makes them look.”