Maria Bordy

Maria Bordy, U.N. Official Photographer makes a picture of Jean Benoit-Levy (left), Director of the U.N. Films and Visual Information Division Marla Bordy (15 August 1916–c.1966) was a Soviet news photographer and public relations officer for the United Nations.

Life and training Marla Bordy (née Tamarkina), also known as Maria Bock-Bordy and Maria Bordes, was born on 15 August 1916 in Toropets (Торопец), Pskov Governorate, Russia, 400 km west of Moscow, with two sisters Frieda and Tamara, and a brother, Hans. She graduated in linguistics from the Moscow College of Foreign Languages in Moscow. He later became a US citizen but she did not. She studied at the School of Modem Photography (SMP), established in 1939 at 487 Park Avenue, New York.

United Nations photographer Fluent in Russian, English, French, German and Spanish, she approached the United Nations for work before it opened and she was one of the first two, and later was among four, press photographers employed in New York. By 1960 she had worked for fifteen years in the Films and Visual Information Section of the United Nations Secretariat in its Department of Public Information (DPI), established in 1946. As appropriate to a given assignment, she used 35mm Nikons and Leicas, and a larger format 4"x 5" Speed Graphic press camera.

Her photographs were widely distributed, first to 35 UN information centres worldwide, and published in a variety of media in the form of press releases, posters and booklets, and as educational film strips (a mid-century multimedia format). She was mentioned also in a Bell Syndicate feature on women at the United Nations as a "tiny Russian photographer on Audrey Langston's staff, who speaks five languages and chalked up some kind of a record when she not only got 8 good picture of camera shy Soviet Delegate Andrei Gromyko, but also made him smile. Her ambition is studio of her own." She was also interviewed about her work and the UN on WKOK on 24 February 1949.

Notable work Her iconic picture of sunlight glancing from the dome of the General Assembly with the Secretariat towering behind, and a backdrop of sun and billowing clouds, was used repeatedly in publicity for the UN. When interviewed for Editor and Publisher in 1960 in which she is described as a "diminutive redhead", she recalled taking the photograph;"...one July morning, walking around its familiar features, I came upon this picture. Symbols are deceptive and often mean different things to different people. But this one, I think, is otherwise. It is one of those rare pictures which do not need a caption and it satisfies you as a composition. The sphere and the rectangle are good solid shapes against the dramatic sky, a bit like piece of modern sculpture with the lucky accident of the sun giving it depth and light. I believe I have caught glimpse here of what many people want the United Nations to be; a solid building for peace firmly planted in our world in the sunshine." A mural print of her photograph of the United Nation General Assembly appeared as the largest image in Edward Steichen’s world-touring The Family of Man exhibition. A copy is held in the Madison Digital Image Database (MDID) collection of James Madison University and 1141 images by her can be accessed in the United Nations News and Media archive.

Suspected espionage United States Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) documentation of 1966 shows Bordy was suspected of involvement in espionage through the 'Silvermaster' group, after she made an expense-free trip to the Soviet Union in 1946; for her frequent contact with the New York City USSR Consulate from 1944 to 1947; and association with Stepan N. Choundenko who was supervisor of Soviet agents Jack Soble and Harry Gold.