Born in Philadelphia, USA, in 1890. Man Ray, whose birth name was Emmanuel Radnitzky, was a photographer, painter, and filmmaker who was the only American to play a major role in both the dada and surrealist movements, and was responsible for several technical innovations in modern art, filmmaking, and photography. Man Ray directed a number of influential avant-garde short films, and also assisted Marcel Duchamp with the cinematography of his film “Anemic Cinema” (1926), and operated the camera on Fernand Léger’s “Ballet Mécanique” (1924). He died in Paris in 1976 at the age of 86.