Barry Feinstein documented Dylan when he was at his most iconic and controversial, on the 1966 tour when he was being jeered for playing an electric guitar. The photographer guards his archive with great care and has no interest in publishing pictures for the sake of it.

When I first visited him a few years ago at his home in Woodstock, in upstate New York, to discuss a book of his Dylan photographs, he told me quite simply that he didn’t have enough to fill a book. “I have about 20 great pictures, that’s all,” he said. I asked if I could take a look at the rest of his file anyway. He seemed bemused and told me that I would be wasting my time. So I looked through sheet after sheet of unmarked contacts, including some for which none of the 36 images on the roll of film had been printed.

I would point out images to Feinstein, such as a shot of Dylan in the back of his limo somewhere in the North of England, looking out of the window using a rolled-up newspaper like a telescope. “Interesting but not great,” he would huff, dismissing what I thought was an incredible image. Other choices he would decline, stating: “That was Bob’s private time.” In the end, almost as many photos were left out of the book as appear in it. Feinstein insists that they will remain unpublished.

To understand this position you need to know more about his career. At Columbia Pictures in Hollywood during the late 1950s he had access to the movie stars of the day – Marlene Dietrich, Judy Garland, Charlton Heston, Jayne Mansfield – but he also chose to document behind the scenes with his unique perspective.

He has photographed Presidents Kennedy and Nixon; Marlon Brando being jostled by racists with banners saying “Brando is a Nigger-loving Creep” at a civil rights meeting; his good friend Steve McQueen on the set of Bullitt; Janis Joplin’s Pearl album cover, photographed the day before she died. The list is a roll call of the world’s greatest entertainers.

The Magnum photo agency asked him to go to Marilyn Monroe’s house the morning she died to cover the breaking story; he chose to photograph the bottle of prescription pills on her bedside table when anyone else would have gone for a more sensational shot.

Feinstein is a modest legend, an incredible artist, a gentleman and one of the most respected photographers in the world. A serious car accident in 1993 effectively put a stop to his regular work. He is currently recovering from surgery, but he has finally started to revisit his archive. How lucky we are.

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