Rare magician, strange alchemist, tells stories through visuals
I am indebted to James McArdle’s blog posting “Work” on his excellent On This Date In Photography website for alerting me to this exhibition, and for reminding me of the work of this outstanding artist, Jakob Tuggener.
The short version: Jakob Tuggener was a draftsman before he became an artist, studying poster design, typography, photography and film. “In 1943, in the middle of the Second World War, Tuggerer’s book Fabrik (Factory) appeared. At first glance, the series of 72 photographs without a text contained therein seems to depict a kind of history of industrialisation – from the rural textile industry to mechanical engineering and high-voltage electrical engineering to modern power plant construction in the mountains. An in-depth reading, however, shows that Tuggener’s film-associative series of photographs simultaneously points to the destructive potential of unrestrained technological progress, as a result of which he sees the then raging World War, and for which the Swiss arms industry produced unlimited weapons. Tuggener was ahead of his time with the book conceived according to the laws of silent film.” (Press release)
Fabrik, subtitled Ein Bildepos der Technik (“Epic of the technological image” or “A picture of technology”) pictures the world of work and industry, and “is considered a milestone in the history of the photo book.” It uses expressive visuals (actions, appearances and behaviours; movements, gestures and details – Tuggener loves the detail) to tell a subjective story, that of the relationship between human and machine. While the book was well ahead of its time, and influenced the early work of that famous Swiss photographer Robert Frank, it did not emerge out of a vacuum and is perhaps not as revolutionary as some people think. Nothing ever appears out of thin air.
“German photographer Paul Wolff, often working in collaboration with Alfred Tritschler, produced a number of exceptional photo books through the 1920s and ’30s, at a time when Constructivism and the Bauhaus influenced many with visions “of an industrialized and socialized society” that placed Germany at “the forefront of European photography” (Martin Parr and Gerry Badger. The Photobook: A History Volume I, Phaidon Press, 2005, p. 86). Arbeit! (1937) is particularly noted for its architectural framing and lighting of massive machinery, its striking portraits of factory workers, and is frequently aligned with works such as Lewis Hine’s Men at Work (1932) and Albert Renger-Patzsch’s Eisen und Stahl (Iron and Steel) (1931).” (Anonymous. “Arbeit!,” on the Bauman Rare Books website [Online] Cited 03/02/2022)
François Kollar’s project La France travail (Working France) (1931-1934), E. O. Hoppé’s Deutsche Arbeit (1930), Heinrich Hauser’s Schwarzes Revier (Black Area) (1930) and Germaine Krull’s Metal (1928) all address the profound social and economic tensions that preceded the Second World War, through an avant-garde photography in the style of “New Vision” and “New Objectivity” – that is, through objective photographs that question common rules of composition, avoiding the more obvious ways subjects would have been photographed at the time. Obscure angles and perspectives abound in these striking photobooks, making their clinical, objective fervour “the great persuaders” of the 1930s and 40s, Modernist and propaganda books of their time.
What made Tuggener so different was the uncompromising subjectiveness of his work, “photographing the two worlds, privilege and labour.” His direct, strong images of factories and high society use wonderful form, light, and shadow to convey their message, never loosing sight of the human dimension, for they shift “our angle from the boss’ POV [point of view] to those unable to get any respite or distance from the situation,” that of the workers. They are a piece of time and human history, which gets closer to the lived reality of the factory floor, than much of the work of his predecessors. Tuggener portrays the mundanity of the “operational sequence” (la chaîne opératoire) of the machine, where the human becomes the oil used to grease the cogs of the ever-demanding “mechanical monsters.” (See Evan Calder Williams’ “Rattling Devils” quotations below)
Tuggener then adds to this new way of seeing which recorded the multiplicity of his points of view – “a modern new style of photography showing not just how things looked, but how it felt to be there” – through the sequencing of the images, which can be seen in the wonderfully combined double pages of the Fabrik book layouts below. Take for example, the photograph that is on the dust jacket, a portrait of a middle-aged worker with a grave look on his face that says, “why the hell are you taking my photograph, why don’t you just f… off.” In the book, Tuggener pairs this image with a whistle letting off steam, a metaphor for the man’s state of being. Tuggener creates these most alien worlds from the inside out, worlds which are grounded in actual lived experience – the little screws lying in the palm of a blackened hand; Navy Cut cigarettes amongst steel artefacts; man being consumed by machine; man being dwarfed by machine; man as machine (the girl paired opposite the counting machine); the Frankenstein scenario of the laboratory (man as monster, machine as man); the intense, feverish eyes of the worker in Heater on electric furnace (the machine human as the devil); and the surrealism of a small doll among the serried ranks of mass destruction, facing the opposition, the opposing lined face of an older worker. This is the stuff of alchemy, the place where art challenges life.
“As Arnold Burgaurer cogently states in his introduction, Tuggener is a jack-of-all-trades: he exhibits, ‘the sharp eye of the hunter, the dreamy eye of the painter; he can be a realist, a formalist, romantic, theatrical, surreal.’ Tuggener’s moves effortlessly between large-format lucidity and grainy, blurred impressionism, in a book that is a decade ahead of its time.” (Martin Parr and Gerry Badger. The Photobook: A History Volume I, Phaidon Press, 2005, p. 144.)
James McCardle observes that, “the meaning of Fabrik is left to the viewer to discover between its pictures, its glimpses of an overwhelming industrial whole; it is essentially filmic on a cryptic film-noir level, a revelation to Frank.” Tuggener’s influence on the early work of Robert Frank can be seen in a sequence from the book Portfolio: 40 Photos 1941/1946 by Robert Frank that was republished by Steidl in 2009 (see below). “Like Tuggener, Frank tackles the task of seemingly incongruous subject matter and finds a harmony through edit and assembly. Again and again throughout this portfolio, Frank is not just trying to show his prowess in making images but in pairing them. They define conflicts in life.” Pace Tuggener. At Frank’s suggestion, Tuggener’s work appeared in both Edward Steichen’s Post-War European Photography and in The Museum of Modern Art’s seminal exhibition, The Family of Man, the latter an essentially humanist exhibition which took the form of a photo essay celebrating the universal aspects of the human experience.
McCardle goes onto suggest that Fabrik, as a photo book, was a model for Frank’s Les Américains: The Americans published fifteen years later in Paris by Delpire, 1958. On this point, we disagree. While his early work as seen in Portfolio: 40 Photos 1941/1946 may have been heavily influenced by Tuggener’s photo book, by the time Frank came to compose Les Américains (for that is what The Americans is, a composition) his point of view had changed, as had that of his camera. While The Americans has many formal elements that can be seen in the construction of the photographs, they also have an element of jazz that would have been inconceivable to Tuggener at that time. Grainy film, strange angles, lighting flare, street lights, night time photography, jukeboxes and American flags portray the American dream not so much from the vantage point of a knowing insider (as Tuggener was) but as a visitor from another planet. Not so much alienating world (man as machine) as alien world, picturing something that has never been recognised before. These are two different models of being. While both are photo books and both pair images together in sequences, Frank had moved on to another point of view, that of an “invalid” outsider, and his photo book has a completely different nature to that of Tuggener’s Fabrik.
Dr Marcus Bunyan
Word count: 1,366
Many thankx to Fotostiftung Schweiz for allowing me to publish some of the photographs in the posting. Please click on the photographs for a larger version of the image.
For Jakob Tuggener, whose works can be seen within the context of social documentary photography, the individual and the industrial boom of the 19th and 20th centuries were central themes. His often somber, black and white photographs seem to confront this new world with a sense of fear as well as admiration. Will technology help relieve us of physically hard labour or replace us altogether? Tuggener owes his renown to his photo book Fabrik (Factory) that was published in 1943. With an aesthetic approach that was unique for his time, Tuggener explores in his photographic essay the relationship between humans and the perceived threat as well as progress of technology. The labourers depicted are grave, their faces worn marked by deep folds, while a factory building in the background stands strong, enveloped in a vaporous cloud. This “Pictorial Epic of Technology,” as Tuggener himself described it, is today considered a milestone in the history of photography books.
Jakob Tuggener (1904-1988) Page layout from the book Fabrik 1943
Selection from the book Portfolio: 40 Photos 1941/1946 by Robert Frank (Steidl, 2009)
The ‘weightless’ and the ‘grounded’ are two opposing themes that Frank repeatedly uses to move us through this sequence. Three radio transistors in a product shot float into the sky while a music conductor, his band and a church steeple succumb to gravity on the facing page. Even in this image Frank shifts focus to the sky and beyond – the weightless. When he photographs rural life, the farmers heft whole pigs into the air and another carries a huge bale of freshly cut grain which seems featherlight but for the woman trailing behind with hands ready to assist.
Considering this work was made while fascism was on the move through Europe, external politics is felt through metaphor. A painted portrait of men in uniform among a display of pots and pans for sale faces a brightly polished cog from a machine – its teeth sharp and precise. In another pairing, demonstrators waving flags in the streets of Zurich face a street sign covered with snow and frost, a Swiss flag blows in the background. in yet another of a crowd of spectators face the illuminated march of a piece of machinery – its illusory shadow filling in the ranks. These pairings feel under the influence of Jakob Tuggener, whose work Frank certainly knew. Like Tuggener, Frank tackles the task of seemingly incongruous subject matter and finds a harmony through edit and assembly.
Again and again throughout this portfolio, Frank is not just trying to show his prowess in making images but in pairing them. They define conflicts in life. One boy struggles to climb a rope while a ski jumper is frozen in flight. Fisherman bask in sunlight while two pedestrians are caught in blinding snowfall.
“Above all, the contrast between the brilliantly lit ballroom and the dark factory hall influenced the perception of his artistic oeuvre,” [curator] Martin Gasser explains. “Tuggener also positioned himself between these two extremes when he stated: ‘Silk and machines, that’s Tuggener’. In reality, he loved both: the wasteful luxury and the dirty work, the enchanting women and the sweaty labourers. For him, they were both of equal value and he resisted being categorised as a social critic who pitted one world against the other. On the contrary, these contrasts belonged to his conception of life and he relished experiencing the extremes – and the shades of tones in between – to the most intense degree.”
“Jakob Tuggener’s ‘Fabrik’, published in Zurich in 1943, is a milestone in the history of the photography book. Its 72 images, in the expressionist aesthetic of a silent movie, impart a skeptical view of technological progress: at the time the Swiss military industry was producing weapons for World War II. Tuggener, who was born in 1904, had an uncompromisingly critical view of the military-industrial complex that did not suit his era. His images of rural life and high-society parties had been easy to sell, but ‘Fabrik’ found no publisher. And when the book did come out, it was not a commercial success. Copies were sold at a loss and some are believed to have been pulped. Now this seminal work, which has since become a sought-after classic, is being reissued with a contemporary afterword. In his lifetime, Tuggener’s work appeared – at Robert Frank’s suggestion – in Edward Steichen’s ‘Post-War European Photography’ and in The Museum of Modern Art’s seminal exhibition, ‘The Family of Man’, in whose catalogue it remains in print. Tuggener’s death in 1988 left an immense catalogue of his life’s work, much of which has yet to be shown: more than 60 maquettes, thousands of photographs, drawings, watercolours, oil paintings and silent films.”
Book description on Amazon. The book has been republished by Steidl in January, 2012.
Jakob Tuggener (1904-1988) is one of the exceptional phenomena of Swiss photography. His personal and expressive recordings of glittering celebrations of better society are legendary, and his 1943 book Fabrik (Factory) is considered a milestone in the history of the photo book. At the centre of the exhibition “Machine time” are photographs and films from the world of work and industry. They not only reflect the technical development from the textile industry in the Zurich Oberland to power plant construction in the Alps, but also testify to Tuggener’s lifelong fascination with all sorts of machines: from looms to smelting furnaces and turbines to locomotives, steamers and racing cars. He loved her noise, her dynamic movements and her unruly power, and he artistically transposed them. At the same time, he observed the men and women who keep up the motor of progress with their work – not without hinting that one day machines might dominate people.
Machine time
Jakob Tuggener knew the world of factories like no other photographer of his time, having completed an apprenticeship as a draftsman at Maag Zahnräder AG in Zurich and then worked in their design department. Through the photographer Gustav Maag he was also introduced to the technique of photography. However, as a result of the economic crisis in the late 1920s, he was dismissed, after which he fulfilled his childhood dream of becoming an artist by studying at the Reimannschule in Berlin. For almost a year he dealt intensively with poster design, typography and film and let himself be carried away with his camera by the dynamics of the big city.
After returning to Switzerland in 1932, he began working as a freelancer for the Maschinenfabrik Oerlikon (MFO), especially for their house newspaper with the programmatic title Der Gleichrichter (The Rectifier). Although the company already employed its own photographer, he was entrusted with the task of developing a kind of photographic interior view of the company. This was intended to bridge the gap between workers and office workers on the one hand and management on the other. By the end of the 1930s, in addition to multi-part reports from the production halls, as well as portraits of “members of the MFO family”, one-sided, album-like series of unnoticed scenes from everyday factory life appeared. From 1937 Tuggener also created a series of 16mm short films – always black and white, silent, and representing the tension between fiction and documentation. This includes, for example, the drama about death and transience (Die Seemühle (The Sea mill), 1944), which was influenced by surrealism and staged by Tuggener with amateur actors in a vacant factory on the shores of Lake Zurich. or the cinematic exploration of the subject of man and machine (Die Maschinenzeit (The Machine Time), 1938-1970). This ties in with the earlier book maquette of the same name and transforms it into a moving, immediately perceptible, but also fleeting vision of the Tuggenean machine age.
In 1943, in the middle of the Second World War, Tuggerer’s book Fabrik (Factory) appeared. At first glance, the series of 72 photographs without a text contained therein seems to depict a kind of history of industrialisation – from the rural textile industry to mechanical engineering and high-voltage electrical engineering to modern power plant construction in the mountains. An in-depth reading, however, shows that Tuggener’s film-associative series of photographs simultaneously points to the destructive potential of unrestrained technological progress, as a result of which he sees the then raging World War, and for which the Swiss arms industry produced unlimited weapons. Tuggener was ahead of his time with the book conceived according to the laws of silent film.1 Neither his uncompromisingly subjective photography nor his critical attitude matched the threatening situation in which Switzerland was called to unity and strength under the slogan “Spiritual Defense”.
Although the book was not commercially successful, Tuggener’s Fabrik was a great artistic success and continued to explore the issues of work and industry. He produced two more book maquettes: Schwarzes Eisen (Black Iron) (1950) and Die Maschinenzeit (The Machine Time) (1952). They can be understood as a kind of continuation of the published book, which the journalist Arnold Burgauer described as a “glowing and sparkling factual and accountable report of the world of the machine, of its development, its possibilities and limitations.” In the mid-1950s, on the threshold of the computer age, Tuggener’s classic “machine time” came to an end. On the one hand, the mechanical processes that had so fascinated Tuggener evaded his eyes. On the other hand, he could not or did not want to make friends with the idea that one day even a human heart could be replaced by a machine.
Portrayer of opposites
As early as 1930 in Berlin, Tuggener had begun to take pictures of the then famous Reimannschule balls. He was fascinated by the tingling erotic atmosphere of these occasions, and he found photography in sparsely lit rooms a great challenge. Back in Zurich, he immediately plunged into local nightlife to surrender to the splendour and luxury of mask, artist and New Year’s balls. Again and again he let himself be abducted by elegant ladies with their silk dresses, their necklines, bare back or shoulders in a glittering fairytale world, whose mysterious facets he sought to fathom with his Leica. Although Tuggener’s ball recordings were only perceived by a small insider audience for a long time, many quickly saw him as a “masterful portrayer of our world of stark contrasts,” a world torn between a brightly lit ballroom and gloomy factory hall. Tuggener also positioned himself between these extremes when he stated, “Silk and machines, that’s Tuggener.” Because he loved both the lavish luxury and the dirty work, the jewelled women and the sweaty men. He felt that he was equal and resisted being classified as a social critic.
In whatever world he moved, Jakob Tuggener did it with the elegance of a grand seigneur [a man whose rank or position allows him to command others]. He was an eye man with a casual, loving look for the inconspicuous, the superficial incident; not just a sensitive picture-poet, but the “photographische Dichter römisch I,” as he used to call himself self-confidently. Critic Max Eichenberger wrote of the Fabrik photographs: “Tuggener is able to make factory photographs that reveal not only a painter, but also a poet, and a rare magician and strange alchemist – lead, albeit modestly turned into gold.”
The exhibition Jakob Tuggener – Maschinenzeit includes vintage and later prints from the early 1930s to the late 1950s, which for the most part come from the photographers estate. In an adjoining room the exhibition will also feature a selection of his 16mm short films from the years 1937-1970, which revolve around the topic of “man and machine” in various ways. These films were newly digitised specifically for the exhibition (in collaboration with Lichtspiel / Cinematheque Bern).
Press release from Fotostiftung Schweiz
1/ The story in silent film is best told through visuals (such as actions, appearances and behaviours). Focus on movements and gestures, and borrow from dance and mime. Large, exaggerated motions translate well to silent films, but balance these also with subtlety (ie. a raised eyebrow, a quivering lip – especially when paired with a close-up shot). Karlanna Lewis. “8 Tips for Making Silent Movies,” on the Raindance website June 1, 2014 [Online] Cited 03/02/2022
Jakob Tuggener (1904-1988) Page layouts from the book Fabrik 1943
Extracts from Shard Cinema by Evan Calder Williams London: Repeater Books, 2017
“All gestures are perhaps inhuman, because they enact that hinge with the world, forging a bridge and buffer that can’t be navigated by words or by actions that feel like purely one’s own. In Vilém Flusser’s definition, a gesture is “a movement of the body or of a tool connected to the body for which there is no satisfactory causal explanation” – that is, it can’t be explained on its own isolated terms.26 The factory will massively extend this tendency, because the “explanation” lies not in the literal circuit of production but in the social abstraction of value driving the entire process yet nowhere immediately visible. We might frame the difficulty of this imagining with the concept of “operational sequence” (la chaîne opératoire), posed by French archaeologist André Leroi-Gourhan, which designates a “succession of mental operations and technical gestures, in order to satisfy a need (immediate or not), according to a preexisting project.”25
26. Vilém Flusser, Gestures (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2014), p. 2. 27. Catherine Perlès, Les Industries Lithiques Taillées de Franchthi, Argolide: Presentation Generate et Industries Paleolithiques (Terre Haute: Indiana University Press, 1987), p. 23.
“Which is to say: we build factories. And in those factories, the process of the exteriorization of memory and muscle becomes almost total, as “the hand no longer intervenes except to feed or to stop” what Leroi-Gourhan, like Larcom, will call “mechanical monsters,” “machines without a nervous system of their own, constantly requiring the assistance of a human partner.”30 But along with engendering the panic of becoming caregiver to the inanimate, this also poses the problem of animation in an unprecedented way. Because if a “technical gesture is the producer of forms, deriving them from inert nature and preparing them for animation,” the factory constitutes us in a different network of the animated and animating.31 It’s a network that can be seen in those writings of factory workers, with their distinct sense of not just preparing those materials but becoming the pivot that eases, smooths, and guides the links of an operational sequence. In particular, a worker functions as the point of compression and transformation between tremendous motive force and products made whose regularity must be assured. The human becomes the regulator of this process, the assurance of an abstract standardization.”
30 André Leroi-Gourhan, Gesture and Speech, trans. Anna Bostock Berger (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1993), p. 246 31. Ibid., p. 313
“… what I’m sketching here in this passage through scattered materials of the century prior to filmed moving images is something simpler, a small corrective to insist that by the time cinema was becoming a medium that seemed to offer a novel form of mechanical time, motion, and vision, one that historians and theorists will fixate on as the unique province and promise of film, many of its viewers had themselves already been enacting and struggling against that form for decades, day in, day out. The point is to place the human operator back in the frame, to ask after those who tended the machine before it was available as a spectacle, and to listen to how they understood what they were tangled in the midst of. But this is neither a humanist gesture of assuring the centrality of the person in the mesh that holds them nor a historical rejoinder to the forgetting and active dismissal of many of these personal accounts. Rather, it’s an effort to show how only with the operator’s experience made central can we see the real historical destruction of such illusions of centrality and, in their place, the novel construction of the human as tender and mender of a flailing inhuman net, the pivot who forms the connective tissue that enacts the lethal animation around her. In short, to see how the real subsumption of labor to capital is not only a systemic or periodizing concept that marks the historical transformation of discrete activities in accordance with the abstractions of value. It also is the granular description of a lived and bitterly contested process by which those abstractions get corporally and mechanically made and unmade, one which we can understand differently if we shift our angle from the boss’ POV to those unable to get any respite or distance from the situation.”
Excerpt from Evan Calder Williams. “Rattling Devils,” on the Viewpoint Magazine website July 13, 2017 [Online] Cited 29/12/2017
Warning: Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander readers should be aware that the posting on this book contains images and names of people who may have since passed away.
Judith Crispin (Australian / Bpangerang, b. 1970) Sonya Napaljarri Cook Painting Warnayaka Arts Centre, Lajamanu Community NT, December 2015
Judith Crispin (Australian / Bpangerang, b. 1970) Tabra Nakamarra’s Puppy Lajamanu Community NT, June 2015
Truth and consequence in red dirt country
Australia has a long tradition of social documentary photography, dating back to the late nineteenth century. From Fred Kruger’s photographs of the Aboriginal community at Coranderrk in the 1870-80s through, variously but not exclusively:
Frank Hurley‘s photographs of the First World War, Antarctic exploration, Aboriginal communities and Australian industry
Charles P. Mountford (1890-1976) was an ethnographer and photographer, working from the 1930s-1960s who “showed a keen interest in and respect for Aboriginal culture, a fact that is evident in his archive. Although peppered with the vernacular and attitudes of the times, Mountford’s writing, and more tellingly his photographs, are indicative of his belief that Aboriginal life was richer and more complex than most white Australians conceded.” (State Library of South Australia)
Mervyn Bishop (born 1945), followed in 1974, an Australian news and documentary photographer whose work combines journalistic and art photography. Joining The Sydney Morning Herald as a cadet in 1962 or 1963, he was the first Aboriginal Australian to work on a metropolitan daily newspaper and one of the first Aboriginal Australians to become a professional photographer. Focusing on Indigenous self-determination, Bishop’s work “covered the major developments in Aboriginal communities throughout Australia, including the historical moment in 1975 when the (then) Prime Minister, Gough Whitlam, poured a handful of earth back into the hand of Vincent Lingiari, Gurindji elder and traditional land owner. This image – representing the Australian government’s recognition of Aboriginal land rights – became an icon of the land rights movement and Australian photography.” (Art Gallery of New South Wales) See more of Mervyn Bishop’s photographs
Joyce Evans (1980s onwards) who took important portraits of a diverse cross-section of Australian intelligentsia and personalities and documented Australian country towns and events for the National Library of Australia
Glenn Sloggett who photographed Australian suburbia with a startling mix of warmth and melancholy from the 1990s onwards
More recently, the war photographs of °SOUTH members such as Tim Page, Stephen Dupont, David Dare Parker, Jack Picone and Michael Coyne
Trent Parkewho is the only Australian member of the Magnum Photo Agency, whose work moves beyond the strictly documentary to sit between fiction and reality, offering an emotional and psychological portrait of family life and Australia that is poetic and often darkly humorous
And Juno Gemes Indigenous social documentary photography, who documents the changing social landscape of Australia
Unlike America, where social documentary photographers are well known, hardly a name from the above list (save perhaps Max Dupain and possibly Frank Hurley) would be recognised by a wider Australian public and there is little evidence or acknowledgement of their work in Australia. I believe that this is because social documentary photography has never been heavily promoted in this country and that this type of photography is a slice of many people’s work without becoming the driving force behind their oeuvre.
As my friend and curator Nick Henderson observes, “Perhaps the lack of visibility is in part due to many of the social documentary photographers undertaking work for the various state libraries, who regularly commission work documenting place – sometimes external, but also staff photographers – whose work is then not exhibited: many of the institutional galleries haven’t devoted much time to displaying and promoting that work.” While there may have been social documentary photographers in each country town and embedded within federal and state institutions, their work never seems to reach the audience it deserves.
And that is the true
Into this amorphous arena comes a brilliant book Sydney based poet, photographer and composer Judith Crispin titled The Lumen Seed (Daylight Books 2016), a book of that addresses the stories of the Warlpiri people of Lajamanu through conversation, poetry, drawings and photographs, a book that should be compulsory reading for all Australians.
This smallish book (in size, 23.5cm wide by 15cm high) of 120 pages has good strong boards, excellent typography, nicely weighted paper and feels solid in the hand. The book is well printed, although some of the highlights of the photographs have gone missing in action. The layout of the images and text is engaging, challenging the reader to comprehend, contemplate and consider what is being shown and spoken to them. Use of negative space, as can be seen in the example pages below, is excellent. The reader does not feel overwhelmed by comatose verbiage, but empowered when listening to the stories, proposed: “This book is about magic. Not the magic of Kabbalists, Theosophists, or conjurers, not Crowley’s magick with a k, not the magic of the New Age or Western religion – but magic that describes the world hidden inside this world, a world seen only by Aboriginal elders and the dying.” (Judith Crispin, Introduction, p. 12)
As Crispin states, this book is not a book of photojournalism and is the most subjective it can be, the photographs growing out of her love for this community. The multi-dimensional photo essay, for that is what it is in more traditional terms, represents some of the views and customs of the Warlpiri people and for Crispin, her journey started in the centre of Australia’s Anglophile government, Canberra, and ended at Wolfe Creek Crater, birthplace of the rainbow snakes, the Warnayarra, which underpin all Australian Aboriginal cultures. The peoples of this ancient culture speak to the earth, they tend it and understand it; they believe in the deep magic of the landscape, and strengthen the land through gardening and the trees through song. They speak to the spirits of the waterholes and have a deep respect for the spirit of the animals that inhabit the land. “The deep love that Warlpiri people have for the landscape, its mountains and waterholes, is almost incomprehensible for white people.” (Juno Gemes, Foreword, p. 9)
I’m British and I have been here in Australia since 1986 and I have never understood the non-relationship Australia has with its Indigenous people. Growing up on a farm for the first twelve years of my life in England gives me some understanding of a life lived well on the land. We were working class poor, my mother having to boil water on a stove so us kids could have a bath in a copper on the kitchen room floor; and we lived on what we could shoot from the land – pigeons, pheasants, rabbits and hares – and we were acutely aware of the providence and blessings of nature for our sustenance. A totally different connection to land than an Aboriginal one, but a connection none the less, as I found out when I visited the old farm on a recent visit to the UK in August. Walking up the cart path where I had played as a kid brought all the magic rushing back… the flowers, the forest, the trees, the animals and the earth.
Therefore, when I read of the white man’s abuse of the traditional lands of the Aboriginal people I am appalled. If you read the extract from Five Threnodies for Maralinga printed below, you begin to understand the pain and anguish of these people, killed by the atomic cloud of over 7 major tests and 700 minor trials involving plutonium, uranium, and beryllium at the Maralinga site which occurred between 1956 and 1963, part of the Woomera Prohibited Area in South Australia and about 800 kilometres north-west of Adelaide. “In 1948, Warlpiri people were forcibly relocated almost 600 kilometers from their spiritual homeland to Hooker Creek, now Lajamanu, in Gurindji country. Old people, afraid to live among Gurindji ancestors and spirits, tried to walk back to Yuendumu but were rounded up and returned.” (p. 45)
This beautiful, powerful and deeply personal book tells some of their stories. It saddens me beyond belief that these wonderful people have been estranged and displaced from their traditional lands; decimated, killed, and abused; have been exposed to nuclear radiation, poverty, and untold harm and deprivation, both physical and mental. That they endure is a testament to their courage and culture. Juno Gemes observes that, “Crispin’s images are filled with compassion and tenderness. This is not an easy work… The Lumen Seed is a tough and powerful work in photographs, narrative texts, drawings, and poems it sings stories off the Warlpiri at Lajamuna at five minutes to midnight.” (p. 9)
The book needs to be tough to tell the true. But through poetry, love and light a new cosmology emerges that brings hope for a better future. Truth and consequence in red dirt country.
Dr Marcus Bunyan
Many thankx to Myrtille Beauvert, Daylight Books and the artist for allowing me to publish the photographs in the posting. Please click on the photographs for a larger version of the image.
The Lumen Seed by Judith Crispin (Daylight Books), a cultural dialogue that is taking place before a backdrop of offences against the Australian continent, as well as a history of systematic discrimination against Indigenous peoples on the part of the country’s white population.
“Yeah, it make me real sad and cry for my country. Because God bin put me there, God put my people there. Why someone could move us, because of his power, because of his idea? Cutting off God’s power, God’s idea here. God’s word, God’s light… and that is the true. Cut off like this electric wire, if you cut him off, like that.”
Jerry Jangala, senior Warlpiri elder and Law man from Lajamanu in the Tanami Desert
“The Lumen Seed is a tough and powerful work. In photographs, narrative texts, drawings, and poems it sings stories of the Warlpiri at Lajamanu at five minutes to midnight. Who will hear, who will see, who will act?
Judith Crispin’s experience echoes mine 40 years earlier, although I could not always get back to the same teachers. We belong to a long photographic tradition. It is the tradition of Tina Modotti and Josef Koudelka – a generation of documentary photographers who believe fervently that if you show people what is actually happening in the world, they will understand and be moved to demand change. Activist social documentary photography has always been defined by this passionate subjective belief in democracy and action.”
Juno Gemes, Introduction to The Lumen Seed, 2016
Judith Crispin. The Lumen Seed book cover
Judith Crispin. The Lumen Seed p. 29
Judith Crispin. The Lumen Seed p. 32
Judith Crispin. The Lumen Seed p. 46
Judith Crispin. The Lumen Seed p. 55
Judith Crispin. The Lumen Seed p. 74
Foreword: Five Minutes to Midnight
There is nothing like twilight in red dirt country – the soft crackling of fire warming your billycan as the Seven Sisters begin their dance across the night sky. Or the camaraderie around a campfire as people speak in their indigenous languages – the women making jokes about the day’s goings-on or about mistakes made in the intricate protocols of a Law you are learning, day by day. Everything that lives has meaning here. Upholding knowledge is a lifelong obligation for First Nation Custodians – not only in the present but into the future. How can we Australians know this land or our place in it, if not through relationship with our hosts, the Aboriginal people?
When inviting me to write this foreword, Judith Crispin explained her choice, saying, “You are uniquely positioned, as Australia’s premier and longest-serving photographer who has worked collaboratively with Aboriginal people in communities around the country making their culture and struggle for justice visible.” Truly, in both a professional and a practical way, I know the difficulties and the deep satisfactions of working in community. I understand the privileges of learning about the Law, the reciprocity of gratitude, and the obligation to stay true to the received teaching over a lifetime.
As a photographer of long experience, with friendships in Aboriginal communities, I know how everything depends on one’s openness to experience, on the give and take inside relationships that informs how one sees and feels. Photographers in this tradition work in slow time. You learn to move with the people, move within the rhythm of their days, within their country, their wind and sky. What is learned through these relationships can change how one sees forever. By invitation, we become messengers from the frontier of interpersonal experience, conveying urgent messages from our teachers and hosts.
Into this collaborative tradition of relational interpersonal documentary photography – which began with the work of committed photographers in Australia during the 1970s – now steps Judith Crispin with her important book about magic, knowledge, and history. She relates teachings of the Law men who adopted her, who gave her the skin name Nangala, a name that defines her relationship to everyone in the community. In this way, she is being “growed up,” learning how to see the universe according to Warlpiri Law.
“There is a particularly miraculous vision of the world that comes only with the diagnosis of serious illness. … Something is different now – because I know there is a secret world nested inside this one. I’ve seen it.”
The Lumen Seed opens onto an apocalyptic scene. A hardwood mulga tree, reaching for the sky, holds a placard: “The Lord’s Return is Near.” In Coober Pedy, a curved handmade house rendered in warm mid-tones is edged with the sign “Welcome to Nowhere.” Dusty desert roadscapes unfold into the giant sacred stones of Karlu Karlu. An emu wanders nonchalantly into a gas station. We’re in Emu Dreaming Country now, meeting Crispin’s traveling friends.
A UFO mural at the gas station resonates later in the book with stories of Wolfe Creek Crater, where the meteorite landed. In the Jukurrpa we are told two rainbow snakes created that country, way back at the beginning. UFOs “zipping around the trees” form part of our desert lore. Funky and surreal, these images are imbued with humour. The images that follow lead us onward into a country of visual narratives – foretelling beginnings and endings. Intuitions manifest unpredictably. We enter a thousand kilometres of “bull dust and bone-jarring track, into the Tanami Desert,” which is as nothing compared with the howling grief of Crispin’s first poem…
Foreword extract by Juno Gemes, Hawkesbury River, April 11, 2016, pp. 6-7.
Introduction
In late 2015 I was diagnosed with cancer. Before then, I’d not understood how five words could change everything. “I’m sorry, Judith,” my doctor told me, “it’s cancer.” It’s a cliché that you only learn to value life when death is walking beside you, but it was absolutely true for me. I remember driving over Clyde Mountain to bring the word cancer to my parents’ home. Every tree on the range seemed invested with vital force. Every leaf was vibrant, iridescent. Gray mountain gums, in headlights, seemed to manifest ancient intelligence – bearing witness to the fleeting existence of human beings. The threat of death reminds you how precious people are – your oldest friends, children, lovers, parents – you wonder how you’ll bear to leave them. There is a particularly miraculous vision of the world that comes only with the diagnosis of serious illness.
The interval between diagnosis and surgery is an eternity. The surgeon showed me a chart – “If the cancer falls into this range,” he said, “you’ll live; this range and you’ll die.” I felt like Schrödinger’s cat, neither living nor dying. People who see their own death live in two worlds, one mundane and one miraculous. Later, when the cancer had been removed and my death sentence lifted, I watched that other world diminish day by day. No matter how I clung to that miraculous vision, it faded – just as the certain knowledge of my death faded. But something remained. Something is different now – because I know there is a secret world nested inside this one. I’ve seen it. …
The earliest photographs in this book were taken in 2013, when I still believed the Warlpiri needed my help – to promote literacy and health, to outline positive pathways toward reconciliation, and so on. The later photographs were taken in December 2015, when I knew, without a shadow of doubt, that I was the drowning woman and the Warlpiri were the lifeboat. Lajamanu’s elders, especially Wanta Jampijinpa, Henry Jackamarra, and Jerry Jangala, were kind to me. They gave me a skin name1 and showed me how to be a “policewoman” for Jdbrille Waterhole. They seemed genuinely delighted by my interest in Warlpiri cosmology, which they illustrated with stories and drawings – some of which are reproduced in this book. The older women took me “hunting” for wattle seed and bush potato. They told me stories of covenants entered into with ancient star-beings and showed me places along the Tanami Track where min-min lights had chased travellers. Fairy tales and mysteries take on new importance when your life feels precarious.
Lajamanu in 2016 is a meeting of two universes. Elders check their Facebook status on iPhones while explaining, in matter-of-fact tones, about a landscape that will hold you or kill you, depending on your scent – where spirit snakes live in the waterways and the dead walk side by side with the living. In Lajamanu I lost my fear of dying, and more importantly, I lost my fear of living. This is a book about magic. Not the magic of Kabbalists, Theosophists, or conjurers, not Crowley’s magick with a k, nor the magic of the New Age or Western religion – but magic that describes the world hidden inside this world, a world seen only by Aboriginal elders and the dying.
This is not a book of photojournalism and makes no attempt to be objective. Quite the contrary, in fact, I wanted this book to be as subjective as possible. These photographs, especially the portraits, have grown out of my love for this community – the poetry of these often physically fragile people, whose unshakable belief in the deep magic of the landscape gives them a strength rarely evident in the city. Warlpiri culture is gentle; it leaves no tracks on the earth. The history of Aboriginal Australia is largely a record of gardening – “cleaning up country” with firestick farming and ceremonies to strengthen trees through song. When Warlpiri people move through the landscape, they introduce themselves. They apologise to that country for breaking twigs. They ask permission to take water from the creeks. If humanity ever transcends its selfish and murderous nature, it will be because of people like the Warlpiri.
Introduction extract by Judith Crispin pp. 11-13.
You shall not trap me in this fish-trap of yours in which you trap the dead,
because I know it, and I know its name,
I know the name in which it came into being.
(Coffin Texts)
Judith Crispin (Australian / Bpangerang, b. 1970) The Lord’s Return is Near Coober Pedy SA, November 2014
The Stuart Highway is a bisecting line in a thousand kilometres of nothing. The sheer scale of the landscape is overwhelming. I’d driven for two days with only Leonard Cohen and David Bowie for company, and had never felt more isolated. I don’t know why I stopped, leaving the Land Rover idling in the middle of the highway, and walked over to the tree. Perhaps its tallness startled me – its length so exposed above the desert floor. I wanted to lay my palm against its bark. At first I didn’t notice the sign nailed high on its trunk: “The Lord’s Return is Near.”
This stretch of highway lies south of the rocket range at Woomera. There are oceans of blood on this land. The Woomera immigration detention centre continued a legacy of suffering that began years earlier, in the 1950s, when Maralinga’s radioactive clouds blew over Woomera, a military township, and killed all the children.
Between 1952 and 1963, British forces dropped nine nuclear weapons and nine thermonuclear weapons between Woomera and the Western Australian border, within contamination distance of urban centres. The Menzies-led Australian government of that time was wholly complicit and lied about the known dangers of nuclear tests. Between these bombings, Britain conducted continuous “minor trials,” which, according to the Royal Commission into British Nuclear Tests in Australia, additionally detonated 99.35 kg of beryllium, 23.979 kg of plutonium, and 7968.88 kg of depleted uranium. By contrast, Little Boy, dropped on Hiroshima in 1945 by the United States, contained only 64 kg of uranium-235, and Fat Man, dropped on Nagasaki in 1945 by the United States, contained only 6.4 kg of plutonium. Anyone who wishes to immediately lose faith in the human race should read the short transcript of the Royal Commission, which is freely available online. (pp. 16-18)
Judith Crispin (Australian / Bpangerang, b. 1970) Welcome to Nowhere Coober Pedy SA, November 2014
I arrived in Coober Pedy the same week that dust storms tore the roof off the pub. This dugout, borrowed from friends in Alice Springs, was built from a disused shaft. I slept near the door separating their home from the remaining length of shaft, extending far into the rock. Strange sounds echoed behind that door – sounds of wind, or dogs howling. The door was nailed closed. When I first visited Coober Pedy, it was the farthest into the desert that I had ever ventured. Beyond it stretched the expanse of the Great Victoria Desert, Simpson Desert, Strzelecki Desert, Pedirka Desert, Tirari Desert, and Sturt Stony Desert. I was at the start of a journey that would follow Stuart Highway into nothingness and emerge in the huge Tanami Desert of the Northern Territory and Western Australia. Leaving the dugout, I stopped to photograph the words painted on its roof: “Welcome to Nowhere.” (pp. 22-23)
Judith Crispin (Australian / Bpangerang, b. 1970) Karlu Karlu I Near Ayleparrarntenhe NT, November 2014
Karlu Karlu, nicknamed “The Devil’s Marbles” by white people, was long considered too spiritually dangerous for anyone but Warumungu elders conducting ceremony. Between these giant stones, on a 48-degree day, the radiant heat is almost unimaginable. Near the skeleton of a burned office chair, I found patches of black glass. A Warumungu friend explained that the heat has, in recent years, become so intense at Karlu Karlu that the air itself ignites, fusing desert sand to glass. In Australia’s deserts the evidence of climate change is irrefutable. (p. 24)
Judith Crispin (Australian / Bpangerang, b. 1970) Eemie at the UFO Roadhouse Wycliffe Well Roadhouse and Van-park NT, December 2015
UFO enthusiast Arc Vanderzalm moved to the desert in 2004 to establish a UFO-themed van park. In the van park’s early years, Arc rescued an abandoned emu chick and raised him by hand. He named him Eemie. Travellers stopping for fuel at Wycliffe Well roadhouse are sometimes surprised by an adult emu staring in at them through the window. While a guest of the van park, I once startled Eemie by walking into the ladies’ shower block. He peered out at me through the shower curtain with an air of embarrassment, as though I’d intruded at a delicate moment. Later, as I drove toward Tennant Creek, I spotted Eemie chasing a farm dog down the highway, legs akimbo. (p. 29)
Judith Crispin (Australian / Bpangerang, b. 1970) Sexy John Alice Springs NT, November 2014
Sexy John was rescued as a small calf after his mother was culled as part of a government program to reduce feral camels. He was raised by artists in a collective on the outskirts of Alice Springs and befriended a wild blond-haired boy. More than 160 thousand camels were culled between 2009 and 2013, approximately one-fifth of the camel population of the central deserts. (p. 35)
Extract from Five Threnodies for Maralinga
V
At Woomera, seventy-five identical graves remember babies lost to the predation of atomic clouds.
Their epitaphs are brief-
Michael Clarke Jones died 24 August 1952, aged eight and a half hours.
No one has been here for a long time.
Weeds struggle. A military vehicle passes, heading east toward the rocket range.
In the west, Woomera township is a grid of air force housing. Land Cruisers fill neat driveways, lawns are trimmed, blinds closed.
And no one ever steps out for milk, no one walks a dog.
I photograph each headstone, stooping sometimes to straighten a plastic posy, a tilted ceramic bear.
Wind presses a faded greeting card to the metal fence. A matchbox car beside a small boy’s grave is blue.
There are nineteen stones without toys or flowers, for stillborns named only “baby”-
Baby Spencer, Baby Dowling, Baby Stone.
Don’t look at me
Baby Gower Baby Roads
from a soldier’s gunny bag with your eyes too white, too open like the eyes of poisoned fish tumbling in the Pilbara’s poisoned surf.
Judith Crispin (Australian / Bpangerang, b. 1970) Warlpiri Family Lajamanu Community NT, December 2015
In 1948, Warlpiri people were forcibly relocated almost 600 kilometers from their spiritual homeland to Hooker Creek, now Lajamanu, in Gurindji country. Old people, afraid to live among Gurindji ancestors and spirits, tried to walk back to Yuendumu but were rounded up and returned. In the 1970s, Gurindji people held a series of unique ceremonies to hand over the area and its Wampana and Spectacled Hare Wallaby Dreaming stories to the residents of Lajamanu. While this gesture brought some relief to Warlpiri people, who viewed their involuntary occupation of Gurindji land as a breach of traditional Law, they continue to struggle with their relationship to the country. (p. 45)
Judith Crispin (Australian / Bpangerang, b. 1970) Four Kurdu-kurdu [Kids] with Trampoline Lajamanu Community NT, December 2015
Country [Gurindji country], hills… well, I put country first… hills, tree, don’t like you – even that water – and that is true. If you drink water from that, or if you not talking to that country because you don’t know, you got no songs with that area… and in the night, or during the day too, you got no language for to try to talk to that country.
When God bin put you there, in your country, that’s it. You got a right to live on there. You can get sick alright, but not too much. Yuwayi [yes], you know God? He say, “Yeah you get sick but you’ll be alright,” you know? “I’m with you there,” that God talking. And same thing for our ceremony too. You’re right to use your ceremony. You’re right to sing your own Dreaming song and talking to your country … and tell it true – real true.
Jerry Jangala (pp. 50-51)
Judith Crispin (Australian / Bpangerang, b. 1970) Emu Roadkill and Portrait by Shemaiah Matthews Lajamanu Community NT, December 2015
Judith Crispin (Australian / Bpangerang, b. 1970) Lily Nungarrayi Yirringali Jurrah-Hargraves Painting Warnayaka Arts Centre, Lajamanu Community NT, December 2015
Without the connection between the land and the person, the individual is lost, empty inside, not connected to anyone or anything or the land. If the connection is lost, they won’t survive and their identity no longer exists. Jukurrpa is our life first. Jukurrpa connects us to our country. It is Law that makes it our right to our country. We can’t be sent away.
This art center [Warnayaka Arts Center] is for the young people to learn their culture and Law. It is important for our youth to learn the knowledge held by the Ngaliya and Warnayaka peoples. The art center is for the survival of culture from the grandfathers’ and grandmothers’ country. The children are getting lost, and there are not many old men left, some women but few men. Some of our important Dreaming sites are hundreds of kilometers from Lajamanu. The grandchildren and great-grandchildren who live in Lajamanu need to know their Jukurrpa; otherwise they will lose their inheritance to this really important country. They need to know the Warlpiri Ngalia Laws so they can go onto their great-grandfathers’ and ancestors’ land, especially where these important Dreaming sites are, like at Mina Mina, belonging to the Kana-kurlangu clan. This is why the art center is so important to the people of Lajamanu. At any time, children can see the works of the elders telling them the Kurdiji, the Law, and all that is tied into the Jukurrpa paintings.
Warnayaka Art elders, recorded by Arts Center manager Louisa Erglis (p. 55)
Judith Crispin (Australian / Bpangerang, b. 1970) Sacred Object #1 Nd Muffler painted by Warlpiri artists
Judith Crispin (Australian / Bpangerang, b. 1970) Sacred Object #2 Nd Abandoned doll found in Lajamanu Park
Judith Crispin (Australian / Bpangerang, b. 1970) Beth Nungarrayi at Jdbrille Waterhole Jdbrille Waterhole, Tanami Desert NT, June 2015
This area here, no river. It’s the same deal in this country, and so – what do you call it? Soak? [A soakage, or soak, also called a native well, is a source of water in the Australian desert.] You know … I’m trying to get that word there. Soak, yeah, you take all right down to find that water, that water make. Sometimes no water, like this time when it’s dry. Look for the water tree. That’s what my father, my grandpa, my great-grandpa, grandmother, they all look for that water tree. Rock holes down. That’s in our country. We can say it today in a Kardiya way, you know? We can say “Lajamanu is my country.” But that not true. It’s not true … yuwayi, Nangala. My country is back there … my area is back there.
Jerry Jangala (pp. 68-69)
Judith Crispin (Australian / Bpangerang, b. 1970) Wirntali-Jarra [Friends] near Emu waterhole, Tanami Desert NT, December 2015
Henry Jackamarra and Jerry Jangala have known each other since they were small children. More than a decade his senior, Henry treats Jerry like a little brother – still lecturing him on what he eats and wears, although both men are now respected elders. (p. 72)
Judith Crispin (Australian / Bpangerang, b. 1970) Jerry Jangala Oversees Kangaroo Ceremony Tanami Desert Outpost NT, November 2014
The animal is honoured by sprinkling handfuls of dirt over its fur before it is prepared for cooking in the traditional way. Jerry explains that in the old days the punishment for getting this ceremony wrong was death. In modern times, the penalty for making mistakes in this ceremony is exile. Wanta Jampijinpa, Jerry’s son, reassured me that exile did not necessarily mean death in the Tanami desert. A person could earn his or her place back in the community by accomplishing a special task. The exile must find the way to catch a wedge-tailed eagle and bring its soft underbelly feathers back to Lajamanu as proof. Wanta explained to me how such a seemingly impossible task could be accomplished, but I do not have permission to reproduce that here. (p. 78)
Judith Crispin (Australian / Bpangerang, b. 1970) Henry Jackamarra Cook, Last Kangaroo Dancer Lajamanu Community NT, December 2015
Light Trails of Henry Jackamarra Cook
Law is a gray kangaroo dancing the thin landscape of Henry Cook into being, somewhere in the Tanami, where knucklebone winds scrape bare rock and Henry stands marsupial in firelight’s weird.
In Lajamanu, tin houses edge the street. No one is outside, no one.
In the arts center, old ladies paint seed-dreaming. Breeze lifts the hem of a curtain, then stillness. It is still.
Henry doesn’t paint anymore. He sits alone, watching ceremony from the 1970s. Everyone in the videos is dead now, except him. And the dead are in the desert, faceless as the desert is, and as remote.
Ten years ago it seemed nothing to walk three days to his sacred country, granite country, where great salt lakes exhale their thirst over spinifex and sand, the rattling sun.
But arthritis and cataracts have caged him. Inside the arts center, the lights are switched off.
We drag chairs across a concrete porch to watch the Tanami darken, shelf clouds seal the crater at Wolfe Creek.
Rain wakens on his tongue the angular syllables of displacement.
And home is the desert breathing over itself by night, erasing tracks of all who walk there – night’s emu rising savage in the Milky Way, and eyes, eyes in the granite mines.
One day, he tells me, I’ll walk out to my country and never come back.
At town’s edge, a kangaroo left by poachers. Red dust thickens its pelt, as the red dust lies thick on Henry’s Ray-Bans, stiffening his white hair to wires.
I photograph him disemboweling the buck, its intestines knotted to ritual marks – Henry and his flayed brother, backlit against chained ridges, and the last sun rearing.
Law is an old man dancing the gray kangaroo into being, sewing him back into the desert’s body, into his own body, ochre and growl, a hunting boomerang beaten on the ground.
Night erases this landscape – slow trees, sand, the saltbush has gone.
Just Henry’s heels rising and falling along a wind-scored track, utterances of a language which belongs to him and to which he belongs.
Tomorrow, the Catfish Waterhole will stretch his white hair out elastic, as telephone wires vanishing into the Tanami.
Mud returns to him, the cool slow memories of country before the missions, before diabetes and grog shrank his ancestors down so small he holds them in a single cupped hand like fireflies, tiny comets crossing in the black.
Tomorrow he’ll thread gumleaves through the hole in his nose, and say, photo me like this Nangala I am a beautiful man.
Judith Crispin (pp. 81-83)
Judith Crispin (Australian / Bpangerang, b. 1970) Lily Nungarrayi Yirringali Tanami Desert NT, November 2014
I was told Lily, when she was young, was in love with a Karadji man but couldn’t be with him because she didn’t want to leave her community. Her arms reveal the parallel ritual marks of someone on a “sacred path.” Now, despite caring relationships with her family, friends, and fourteen adopted dogs, somehow Lily is always alone. When, together with Molly and Rosie, Lily took me to see Catfish Waterhole, she explained that we were going to see her “mother.” I carried Lily, too frail to descend the bank, to the edge of the water. There she turned water over her palms, the traditional way of greeting the waterhole and avoiding surprising any Warnayarra who might be there. The deep love that Warlpiri people have for the landscape, its mountains and waterholes, is almost incomprehensible for white people. Here Lily sings quietly to Catfish Waterhole – not for any ceremonial or traditional reason, I’m told, but just because it makes the waterhole feel loved. (p. 95)
Judith Crispin (Australian / Bpangerang, b. 1970) Molly’s Flame-Tree Seed-pods Tanami Desert NT, November 2014
Judith Crispin (Australian / Bpangerang, b. 1970) Molly Napurrula Sifts Wattleseed Tanami Desert NT, November 2014
Warlpiri people still supplement their diet with bush food. Ground wattleseed is mixed with oil and baked into a kind of flat bread. The older ladies took me out “hunting” for wattleseed and kurrajong seedpods. In a township with only one shop, where a head of broccoli costs more than a takeaway meal for a family, it is vitally important to supplement the community’s diet with “bush food.” White Australians have almost no idea of the variety of native fruits and vegetables that grow in the apparent desert – bush potatoes, bush tomatoes, bush bananas, honey ants, land crabs, wattleseeds, etc., can be gathered throughout the Tanami. (p. 104)
Clarence H. White (American, 1871-1925) The Bubble 1898, printed 1905 Platinum print 24.2 x 19.3cm (9 1/2 x 7 5/8 in.) Alfred Stieglitz Collection, 1933 The Metropolitan Museum of Art
A sense of the beyond
I have waited over nine years to be able to do a posting on this artist. This is the first retrospective of Clarence H. White’s photographs in a generation… and my first posting for 2018. What a beauty the posting is, and what beauty is contained within, his photographs.
White was born in Newark, Ohio (see map below) in 1871. Just to put that into perspective, of the big three Alfred Stieglitz was born in 1871, Edward Steichen in 1879 and Paul Strand in 1890. Soon after marrying his wife in 1893 White took up photography, applying some of his artistic vision, developed earlier through filling sketchbooks with pencil sketches, pen-and-ink drawings and watercolours, to the craft of photography. “He learned how to use light, or the lack of it, to draw attention to his subject. He also learned how to visualise his subjects in his mind.” He was completely self-taught, “in part because he had no money to pay for training or courses at the time when he was developing his own vision in the medium. Many of his friends, students and biographers believe his lack of any formal training was one of his greatest strengths… It is important to note that at that time there were no formal schools of photography in the U.S. or even acknowledged leaders with whom White might have studied.”1
In 1895, he exhibited his first photos in public, at the Camera Club of Fostoria, Ohio, and by 1898 he had met Fred Holland Day and Alfred Stieglitz. His star continued to rise, White having solo exhibitions in 1899 at the Camera Club of New York and at the Boston Camera Club, and he also exhibited in the London Photographic Salon organised by The Linked Ring. In 1900 White was elected to membership in The Linked Ring and in 1901 White and 10 others to become “charter members” of the Photo-Secession, a group founded by Alfred Stieglitz to promote Pictorialism and fine art photography. Due to financial constraints during this time, White was only able to create about 8 photographs each month, and he had to photograph either very early in the morning, after he finished work as a bookkeeper, or at the weekend. Some of his most memorable images were created at this time, before his move to New York in 1906. As Cathleen A. Branciaroli and William Inness Homer observe in “The Artistry of Clarence H. White”, “White is most significant in the history of photography because, in his early years, he redefined the nature of picture-making, creating a distinctly modern idiom for his own time…. He reduced his compositions to very simple elements of form, and by experimenting with principles of design derived largely from Whistler and Japanese prints, he created a personal style that was unique for photography.”2
If the photograph consumes light, then Clarence H. White was consumed by photography. Informed by the widespread Japonisme of the period, especially ukiyo-e prints (the term ukiyo-e translates as “picture[s] of the floating world”) with their flat perspective, unmodulated colours and outlined forms – his photographs “sought to capture either the geometry of perceived pattern or the gorgeous effect of shimmering light… qualities of image that the camera, conjoining realism and poetic perception, could render with compelling effect.”3 We now group these kind of photographs under the label “pictorialism,” soft-focus photographs that were more than purely representational, that project “an emotional intent into the viewer’s realm of imagination.”4 Here, an “atmosphere” (formulated, created, conceptualised, captured) is the key to conveying an expressive mood and an emotional response to the viewer “through an emphasis on the atmospheric elements in the picture and by the use of “vague shapes and subdued tonalities … [to convey] a sense of elegiac melancholy.””5
After his move to New York in 1906, White and Stieglitz “jointly created a series of photographs of two models, Mabel Cramer and another known only as Miss Thompson,” in 1907. This was the only time that Stieglitz ever worked with another photographer. “In 1908 Stieglitz continued to show his admiration for White by devoting an entire issue of Camera Work to him and 16 of his photographs. It was only the third time Stieglitz had singled out an individual photographer for this honor (the others were Steichen and Coburn).”6 In 1910, White set up the Seguinland School of Photography, the first independent school of photography in America, while in 1912 he had a terminal falling out with the excessive ego of Stieglitz. “First Käsebier, then White and finally Steichen broke off their relationship with Stieglitz, each citing Stieglitz’s overbearing ego, his refusal to consider other’s viewpoints and his repeated actions on behalf of the Photo-Secession without consulting any of the so-called “members” of the group.”7
Encouraged by his newfound freedom to act outside of the shadow of Stieglitz, White founded the Clarence H. White School of Photography in 1914… an influential school which, over the next decade, “attracted many students who went on to become notable photographers, including Margaret Bourke-White, Anton Bruehl, Dorothea Lange, Paul Outerbridge, Laura Gilpin, Ralph Steiner, Karl Struss, Margaret Watkins and Doris Ulmann.”8 In his class “The Art of Photography” White stressed that the primary thing his students had to learn was “the capacity to see.” White became one of the most important teachers of photography of the age. White died suddenly of a heart attack while on a trip to Mexico with students to take his first photographs in years. He was 54 years old.
After Alfred Stieglitz died in 1946 numerous photographs by White were found in his personal collection. Despite their differences, it is obvious that Stieglitz held White in very high regard, “one of the very few who understand what the Photo-Session means & is.”9 “Although White and Stieglitz had tried to reconcile their differences before White died, Stieglitz never forgave White for breaking from him in 1912. Upon hearing about White’s untimely death, Stieglitz wrote to Kuehn, “Poor White. Cares and vexation. When I last saw him he told me he was not able to cope with [life as well as he was] twenty years ago. I reminded him that I warned him to stay in business in Ohio – New York would be too much for him. But the Photo-Session beckoned. Vanity and ambitions. His photography went to the devil.” In spite of these words, Stieglitz had 49 of White’s photographs, including 18 created jointly with Stieglitz, in his personal collection when he died.”10
There is something undeniable in what Stieglitz says. White’s greatest photographs emerge from the Stygian dusk, a dash of melancholy, a lot of beauty, mostly before he moved to New York. It says a lot that Stieglitz still thought that much of him as an artist, a man, and as an emasculated friend, that he kept nearly 50 of his photographs in his personal collection until he died. Stieglitz knew the nature of (his) genius.
The value of self-expression and direct engagement with experience
Clarence H. White’s artistic achievements may have been overshadowed by the likes of Stieglitz, Steichen and Strand’s later modernist photographs, but there is no doubt in my mind that he is a colossus, a monster in the history of art photography. Simply put, there is no one else like him in the history of photography, for you can always recognise the “signature” of a White photograph.
Peter Bunnell notes, “[White] celebrated elemental things, the time spent playing in the fields or woods, the simple pleasure of unhurried living, the playing of games in interior spaces…. White, growing up within an extended family, knowing nothing else, had no real sense of other societies and his pictures thus had a kind of fortification against the outside. They were his private epic.”12 His private epic was a personal mythology which expressed his personality and distinctive sentiments through his photographs of imagined worlds. This is the critical thing that makes him so different from other photographers of the period: he was beholden to no movement, no school, teacher or narrative – but only to himself. In his best photographs it was this private world writ large in light that made him famous.
His “masterful reinterpretation of the possibilities of light and the photographic medium done with artistic intent”11 allowed him to develop this personal mythology. White learned how to visualise his subjects in his imagination, before rendering them by drawing in light. His unique prints, made in a variety of processes (platinum, gum-platinum, palladium, gum-palladium, gum, glycerin developed platinum, cyanotype and hand-coated platinum) with the same image sometimes printed using different processes,13 celebrate “pure photography”, a cerebral, ethereal emanation of pure light and form. They seem not of this earth. Indeed, I would argue that White steps outside strict Pictorialism into this “other”, private realm.
There may be, as Peter Bunnell suggests, a luminosity of tone in his prints rarely achieved in the history of photography, but there was also a luminosity in his thinking, in the way he approaches the medium itself. I look at the photograph The Deluge (c. 1902-1903, below) and I think of William Blake. I look at the three versions of the photograph Spring – A Triptych [Letitia Felix] (1898, below) and observe how each iteration is different (in colour, tone and inflection), but how they are just as valid as each other. There are personal, domestic quotidian scenes (Blindmans’ Bluff, 1898 or Mother was living in the old home alone, 1902); mythic scenes, such as the glorious photograph The Bubble (1898, above) where the figure seems to hover above the ground (“pictures of the floating world”); and early Modernist inclinations such as Drops of Rain (1903, below) and Newport the Maligned (1907, below). But above all, there is the light which shines from within.
Further, his was a whole art aligned perhaps subconsciously, perhaps not, to that German Art Nouveau movement named after the Munich periodical Die Jugend (‘Youth’) – Jugendstijl. “A decorative art with the mid-century idea of the gesamtkunstwerk; the ‘total work of art’ applied in Wagner’s opera and in Dülfer’s architecture, Jugendstil before 1900 favoured floral motifs and ukiyo-e prints of Japanese art.” Evidence of this ‘total work of art’ (an expression of folk legend as universal humanist fable), can be seen in the few Pictorialist works from the late 1890s that survive in their original exhibition frames (see below). The plain dark wood frames with their curved tops serve to further isolate and flatten the pictorial space of the photograph; the dark colour of the wood pushing against the luminosity, line, form and reddish brown colour of the prints. The last version of Spring – A Triptych (Letitia Felix) (1898, below) is particularly illuminating in this respect, the dark wood framing the individual panels fragmenting the field upon which the young woman stands, so that we are no longer in a fairytale landscape (as in the first iteration) but surrounded by writhing tree trunks of sombre hue with a ghost-like presence walking amongst them. And then we see how these photographs were originally exhibited!
In Display of Clarence H. White photographs in Newark Camera Club exhibition, Young Men’s Christian Association building, Newark, Ohio, 1899 (below) we observe, we are witness to, a flow of energy from one side of the wall to the other – none of this staid singular hanging “on the line” – but a dynamic narrative that moves the viewer both physically and mentally. How wondrous is this display! An then in William Herman Rau’s photograph Untitled [Clarence H. White works in Second Philadelphia Photographic Salon installation (1899, below) we see a networked display, almost a cross-like shape, with portraits surrounding what looks like a central landscape image (although it is difficult to make out exactly what the image is). This is an almost contemporary sequencing of photographic work, still used by the likes of Annette Messager today… a perfect example of gesamtkunstwerk, where White has fully understood concept, narrative, form, function, the physicality of the photograph, it’s frame, and the context and environment of the image display.
To me, the early prints of Clarence H. White give the sense that he has found a metaphor, but he is not sure what that metaphor relates to: a cosmology? / man creating something of wonder (when viewed with imagination)?
He is still working it out… and then he goes to New York. Does it matter that he didn’t find the answer? A thing that is done as a reaction to a situation. Not at all. It’s the journey that matters.
The sense of ethereal beauty and the beyond that he captured on his glass plates are enough to make him a genius in my eyes. “Images arising from dreams are the well spring of all our efforts to give enduring form and meaning to the urgencies within,” states Douglas Fowler.14 White’s oneiric photographs, and our prior experiences with dreaming and imagination, help to create a sense of oneness with his photographs. Ultimately, his private epic, his personal mythology brought these aspects of art into photography.
Dr Marcus Bunyan
Many thankx to the Princeton University Art Museum for allowing me to publish the art work in the posting. Please click on the art work for a larger version of the image.
2/ Cathleen A. Branciaroli and William Inness Homer. “The Artistry of Clarence H. White,” in Homer, William Innes (ed.). Symbolism of Light: The Photographs of Clarence H. White. Wilmington, DE: Delaware Art Museum, 1977, p. 34
4/ “Pictorialism is the name given to an international style and aesthetic movement that dominated photography during the later 19th and early 20th centuries. There is no standard definition of the term, but in general it refers to a style in which the photographer has somehow manipulated what would otherwise be a straightforward photograph as a means of “creating” an image rather than simply recording it. Typically, a pictorial photograph appears to lack a sharp focus (some more so than others), is printed in one or more colours other than black-and-white (ranging from warm brown to deep blue) and may have visible brush strokes or other manipulation of the surface. For the pictorialist, a photograph, like a painting, drawing or engraving, was a way of projecting an emotional intent into the viewer’s realm of imagination.”
Anonymous. “Pictorialism,” on the Wikipedia website [Online] Cited 02/01/2018
5/ Naomi Rosenblum. A World History of Photography. New York: Abbeville Press, 1989, p. 297 quoted in Anonymous. “Pictorialism,” on the Wikipedia website [Online] Cited 02/01/2018
7/ Maynard Pressley White Jr. Clarence H. White: A Personal Portrait. Wilmington, Delaware: University of Delaware, PhD dissertation, 1975 quoted in Anonymous. “Clarence Hudson White,” on the Wikipedia website [Online] Cited 02/01/2018
8/ Lucinda Barnes (ed.) with Constance W. Glenn and Jane L. Bledsoe. A Collective Vision: Clarence H. White and His Students. Long Beach, CA: University Art Museum, 1985 in Anonymous. “Clarence Hudson White,” on the Wikipedia website [Online] Cited 02/01/2018
9/ Maynard Pressley White Jr. Clarence H. White: A Personal Portrait. Wilmington, Delaware: University of Delaware, PhD dissertation, 1975, p. 175 quoted in Anonymous. “Clarence Hudson White,” on the Wikipedia website [Online] Cited 02/01/2018
10/ Weston J. Naef. The Collection of Alfred Stieglitz, Fifty Pioneers of Modern Photography. NY: Viking Press, 1978, pp. 482-493 quoted in Anonymous. “Clarence Hudson White,” on the Wikipedia website [Online] Cited 02/01/2018
11/ Peter Bunnell. Clarence H. White: The Reverence for Beauty. Athens, Ohio: Ohio University Gallery of Fine Arts, 1986, p. 17 quoted in Anonymous. “Clarence Hudson White,” on the Wikipedia website [Online] Cited 02/01/2018
13/ “White sometimes printed the same image using different processes, and as a result there are significant variations in how some of his prints appear. His platinum prints have a deep magenta-brown tone, for example, whereas his gum prints have a distinct reddish hue. Photogravures of his images in Camera Work, which he considered to be true prints, were more neutral, tending toward warm black-and-white tones.”
Maynard Pressley White Jr. Clarence H. White: A Personal Portrait. Wilmington, Delaware: University of Delaware, PhD dissertation, 1975, p. 68 quoted in Anonymous. “Clarence Hudson White,” on the Wikipedia website [Online] Cited 02/01/2018
14/ Douglas Fowler. The Kingdom of Dreams in Literature and Film: Selected Papers from the Tenth Annual Florida State University Conference on Literature and Film. Tallahassee: University Presses of Florida, 1986, p. 10 quoted in Anonymous. “Oneiric (film theory),” on the Wikipedia website [Online] Cited 03/01/2018
Newark, Ohio – where Clarence H. White was born and taught himself photography
Lecture Clarence H White and His World
Anne McCauley, curator of the exhibition and David Hunter McAlpin Professor of the History of Photography and Modern Art, explores the legacy of one of the early twentieth century’s most gifted photographers and influential teachers. Program took place on Saturday, October 14, 2017.
Clarence H. White Analysis and Collaborative Discovery
Collaboration with Yale Reveals Late Nineteenth and Early Twentieth-Century Photographic Processes
Preparations for the first retrospective exhibition in a generation of pioneer photographer Clarence Hudson White (1871-1925) have inspired an unexpected collaboration between the Princeton University Art Museum and the Yale Institute for the Preservation of Cultural Heritage. Immersed in the real-life setting of the Princeton University Art Museum, the project drew students, researchers, and curators from across two universities and from numerous disciplines to analyse the experimental techniques that took place during the “Pictorialism” period of the late 19th and early 20th centuries.
Unknown photographer Display of Clarence H. White photographs in Newark Camera Club exhibition, Young Men’s Christian Association building, Newark, Ohio, 1899 1899
Unknown photographer Jury of the Second Philadelphia Photographic Salon 1899
Photograph shows, from left: Frances Benjamin Johnston, Clarence H. White, F. Holland Day, Gertrude Käsebier, and Henry Troth
William Herman Rau (1855-1920) Untitled [Clarence H. White works in Second Philadelphia Photographic Salon installation] 1899
Photograph shows a wall installation of photographs by Clarence H. White at the second exhibition of the Philadelphia Photographic Salon; according to the catalog for the exhibition, the works shown are “Fear”, “Morning”, “A Puritan”, “The Bubble”, “Lady in Black”, “Evening : An Interior”, “On the Old Stair”, “At the Old Canal Lock”, and “Lady with the Venus.” Also includes a portrait, presumably of White, half-length, facing right.
Clarence H. White (American, 1871-1925) A Rift in the Clouds 1896 Platinum print Image (window): 10.3 x 13.9cm (4 1/16 x 5 1/2 in.) Frame: 28.6 × 36.2cm (11 1/4 × 14 1/4 in.) The Clarence H. White Collection, assembled and organised by Professor Clarence H. White Jr., and given in memory of Lewis F. White, Dr. Maynard P. White Sr., and Clarence H. White Jr., the sons of Clarence H. White Sr. and Jane Felix White
Clarence H. White (American, 1871-1925) A Rift in the Clouds 1896 Platinum print Image (window): 10.3 x 13.9cm (4 1/16 x 5 1/2 in.) Frame: 28.6 × 36.2cm (11 1/4 × 14 1/4 in.) The Clarence H. White Collection, assembled and organised by Professor Clarence H. White Jr., and given in memory of Lewis F. White, Dr. Maynard P. White Sr., and Clarence H. White Jr., the sons of Clarence H. White Sr. and Jane Felix White
White was completely self-taught throughout his career, in part because he had no money to pay for training or courses at the time when he was developing his own vision in the medium. Many of his friends, students and biographers believe his lack of any formal training was one of his greatest strengths. When a one-man exhibition of his work was held in Newark in 1899, fellow Newark photographer Ema Spencer wrote, “He has been remote from artistic influences and is absolutely untrained in the art of the schools. In consequence, traditional lines have unconsciously been ignored and he has followed his own personal bent because he has been impelled by that elusive and inscrutable force commonly known as genius.” It is also important to note that at that time there were no formal schools of photography in the U.S. or even acknowledged leaders with whom White might have studied. The most common way a new photographer learned the trade was by working with an experienced photographer, and, other than a few portraitists, there was no one to learn from in Newark.
Clarence H. White (American, 1871-1925) The Girl with the Violin 1897 Platinum print with gouache in original frame Image: 14.7 x 14cm (5 13/16 x 5 1/2 in.) Frame: 22.9 x 22.4cm (9 x 8 13/16 in.) The Clarence H. White Collection, assembled and organised by Professor Clarence H. White Jr., and given in memory of Lewis F. White, Dr. Maynard P. White Sr., and Clarence H. White Jr., the sons of Clarence H. White Sr. and Jane Felix White
Clarence H. White (American, 1871-1925) The Deluge c. 1902-1903 Gum bichromate print Image (arched top): 20.2 x 16.2cm (7 15/16 x 6 3/8 in.) Frame: 43.8 × 36.2 × 3.2cm (17 1/4 × 14 1/4 × 1 1/4 in.) The Clarence H. White Collection, assembled and organised by Professor Clarence H. White Jr., and given in memory of Lewis F. White, Dr. Maynard P. White Sr., and Clarence H. White Jr., the sons of Clarence H. White Sr. and Jane Felix White
Clarence H. White (American, 1871-1925) Just a Line 1897 Platinum print in original frame Image: 19.2 x 13.3cm (7 9/16 x 5 1/4 in.) Frame: 28.8 x 22.9cm (11 5/16 x 9 in.) The Clarence H. White Collection, assembled and organised by Professor Clarence H. White Jr., and given in memory of Lewis F. White, Dr. Maynard P. White Sr., and Clarence H. White Jr., the sons of Clarence H. White Sr. and Jane Felix White
Clarence H. White (American, 1871-1925) Climbing the Hill 1897 Platinum print with gouache in original frame Image: 20 x 16cm (7 7/8 x 6 5/16 in.) Frame: 34.5 x 30.5cm (13 9/16 x 12 in.) The Clarence H. White Collection, assembled and organised by Professor Clarence H. White Jr., and given in memory of Lewis F. White, Dr. Maynard P. White Sr., and Clarence H. White Jr., the sons of Clarence H. White Sr. and Jane Felix White
Clarence H. White (American, 1871-1925) At the Window 1896, printed 1897 Platinum print in original frame Image: 20.4 x 14.2cm (8 1/16 x 5 9/16 in.) Frame: 29.8 x 22.9cm (11 3/4 x 9 in.) The Clarence H. White Collection, assembled and organised by Professor Clarence H. White Jr., and given in memory of Lewis F. White, Dr. Maynard P. White Sr., and Clarence H. White Jr., the sons of Clarence H. White Sr. and Jane Felix White
“These photographs [above] are among the few Pictorialist works from the late 1890s that survive in their original exhibition frames.”
Wall text from the exhibition
Gertrude L. Brown (approximately 1870-1934) Clarence H. White (seated center), Gertrude Käsebier (seated right), and students, Summer School of Photography, Five Islands, Maine c. 1913 Clarence H. White School of Photography
“My photographs were less sharp than others and I do not think it was because of the lens so much as the conditions under which the photographs were made – never in the studio, always in the home or in the open, and when out of doors at a time of day very rarely selected for photography.”
Clarence H. White
“I think that if I were asked to name the most subtle and refined master photography has produced, that I would name him… To be a true artist in photography one must also be an artist in life, and Clarence H. White was such an artist.”
Alvin Langdon Coburn
“What he brought to photography was an extraordinary sense of light. ‘The Orchard’ is bathed in light. ‘The Edge of the Woods’ is a tour de force of the absence of light.”
Beaumont Newhall
“Clarence White’s poetic vision and sensitive intuition produced images that insinuate themselves deeply into one’s consciousness.”
Edward Steichen
“[White] celebrated elemental things, the time spent playing in the fields or woods, the simple pleasure of unhurried living, the playing of games in interior spaces… White, growing up within an extended family, knowing nothing else, had no real sense of other societies and his pictures thus had a kind of fortification against the outside. They were his private epic.”
“The qualities that make White’s photographs memorable have to do with both form and content. In his finest pictures the disposition of every element, of each line and shape, is elevated to an expressive intensity few photographers managed to attain. … White was able to transform the sensory perception of light into an exposition of the most fundamental aspect of photography – the literal materialisation of form through light itself. His prints, mostly in the platinum medium, display a richness, a subtlety, and a luminosity of tone rarely achieved in the history of photography.”
Peter Bunnell
Innovative American Photographer Clarence H. White Receives First Retrospective in a Generation
The vision and legacy of photographer Clarence H. White (1871-1925), a leader in the early twentieth-century effort to position photography as an art, will be the focus of a major traveling exhibition organised by the Princeton University Art Museum. The first retrospective devoted to the photographer in over a generation, Clarence H. White and His World: The Art and Craft of Photography, 1895-1925 will survey White’s career from his beginnings in 1895 in Ohio to his death in Mexico in 1925.
On view at the Princeton University Art Museum from October 7, 2017, through January 7, 2018, the exhibition will draw on the Clarence H. White Collection at the Museum and the deep holdings at the Library of Congress as well as loans from other public and private collections. Clarence H. White and His World reasserts White’s place in the American canon and, in the process, reshapes and expands our understanding of early twentieth-century American photography.
White’s career spans the radical shifts in photographic styles and status from the Kodak era of the 1890s; the corresponding fight for art photography primarily associated with his friend and fellow photographer Alfred Stieglitz; and the postwar rise of advertising and fashion photography. While living in a small town in Ohio, White received international recognition for his beautiful scenes of quiet domesticity and his sensitivity to harmonious, two-dimensional composition. With his move to New York in 1906, he became renowned as a teacher, first at Teachers College with Arthur Wesley Dow, then in the summer school he established in Maine, and finally with the Clarence H. White School of Photography, founded in 1914. Among his students were some of the most influential artistic and commercial photographers of the early twentieth century: Laura Gilpin, Doris Ulmann, Paul Outerbridge, Ralph Steiner, Margaret Watkins, Dorothea Lange, Karl Struss, Anton Bruehl and hundreds more who did not become professional photographers but were shaped by White’s belief that art could enrich the lives of everyday Americans.
“The goal of the exhibition is to locate White’s own diverse and rich body of work within a period of great social and aesthetic change, from the Gilded Age to the Roaring Twenties,” said Anne McCauley, exhibition curator and David Hunter McAlpin Professor of the History of Photography and Modern Art at Princeton. “Far from staying stuck in the nineteenth century, White embraced new media like cinema and new commercial uses for photography, including fashion and advertising.”
The exhibition will feature photographs by White’s fellow Photo-Secessionists and his students as well as a selection of paintings and prints by other artists whom he knew and admired, and was influenced by or whose work he shaped, including William Merritt Chase, Thomas Dewing, Max Weber, Edmund Tarbell and John Alexander.
Also explored within the exhibition are White’s links to the American Arts and Crafts movement, his embrace of socialism, his radically modern representations of childhood, and his complicated printing and framing processes. Of particular note is his lifelong investment in photographing the nude model, culminating in series that he made with Alfred Stieglitz in 1907 and with Paul Haviland in 1909, brought together here for the first time.
“As an artist and a teacher, White emerges as one of the essential American innovators of the early twentieth century, dedicated to the creation of beauty,” notes James Steward, Nancy A. Nasher – David J. Haemisegger, Class of 1976, Director. “Through significant new archival research and bringing together works not seen in one setting since the artist’s lifetime, this exhibition and publication aim to reaffirm White’s astonishing accomplishments.”
After premiering at the Princeton University Art Museum, the exhibition travels to the Davis Museum, Wellesley College (February 7-June 3, 2018), the Portland Museum of Art, Maine (June 30-September 16, 2018) and the Cleveland Museum of Art (October 21, 2018-January 21, 2019). The exhibition is accompanied by a sumptuous 400-page catalogue by Anne McCauley, published by the Princeton University Art Museum and distributed by Yale University Press, with contributions by Peter C. Bunnell, Verna Posever Curtis, Perrin Lathrop, Adrienne Lundgren, Barbara L. Michaels, Ying Sze Pek and Caitlin Ryan.
Press release from the Princeton University Art Museum
The Clarence H. White School of Photography
In 1910, to augment his courses in New York City and bring in extra income, White opened a summer school for photography. Named the Seguinland School of Photography, it was housed in a hotel, which was to be part of the new “Seguinland” resort on the mid-coast of Maine near Georgetown and Seguin Island. Pictorialist photographer F. Holland Day, who summered nearby, had earlier invited White and his family to the area for a respite from the city and the opportunity to explore creative photography outdoors. The fellowship between the two photographers and their families was an important factor in White’s decision to start the summer school. Students wore sailor suits, a practice begun by Day and his summer guests, and boarded at the Seguinland Hotel. Day regularly conducted critiques for White’s students, as on occasion did New York photographer Gertrude Käsebier. After 1912, the Pilot House adjacent to the hotel served as the school’s studio and darkroom. Among the students attracted to the idyllic coastal setting was the Pictorialist Anne W. Brigman from Northern California, who made the pilgrimage to Maine during an eight-month visit to the East Coast. White’s summer school in Maine lasted until 1915, when White relocated to northwestern Connecticut’s Berkshire Hills for summers. He reintroduced a summer school there, first in East Canaan, and then in Canaan that lasted until his death.
In the fall of 1914, the Clarence H. White School of Photography opened its doors at 230 E. 11th St. in New York City. This was the first of four locations for the school in the burgeoning art and publishing capital. White’s first instructor for art appreciation and design between 1914 and 1918 was avant-garde painter Max Weber, who often posed for the students. When Weber left, White hired one of his Columbia students, Charles J. Martin.
In 1917 the school occupied the “Washington Irving House” at 122 E. 17th St. at the corner of Irving Place near Union Square and Gramercy Park. Three years later, when that location was no longer available, the Clarence H. White Realty Corp. was formed in order to purchase a building for the school, and the White School resettled again, at 460 W. 144th St., where it remained until 1940. The uptown location provided a meeting place for White’s Columbia classes. From the 1920s on, photographer Edward Steichen was among those who served regularly as guest lecturers. White students paid $150 per semester, a fee that held constant until the school’s closing.
After Clarence White’s unexpected death in 1925, friends urged his widow to carry on despite the fact that his personality had been crucial to the advancement of the school. Though Jane Felix White was not a photographer herself, she took on the challenge and remained the school’s director until her retirement in 1940, when her youngest son, Clarence H. White Jr., took over. Jane and Clarence Jr. recruited more students, raising the enrolment to 106 by 1939. With greater numbers came significant changes: twice as many men as women (a reversal of the previous 2-to-1 ratio of women to men) and new classes. Art integrated with technique – the school’s previous hallmark – was no longer central to the curriculum. Nonetheless, the school continued to prosper, and its reputation surpassed other competitors, such as the New York Institute of Photography, a commercial school established in 1910, and the Studio School of Art Photography, which began in 1920 and continued a strict orientation toward the soft-focus, Pictorialist style. A poorly timed and costly move to larger, more centrally located quarters at 32 West 74th Street in 1940, however, soon helped bring about its closure. The mobilisation for World War II dealt the White School its final blow. After surviving for three decades, it closed its doors in 1942.
Clarence H. White (American, 1871-1925) Spring – A Triptych (Letitia Felix) 1898 Gum bichromate prints with graphite Image (1): 16.8 x 2.7cm (6 5/8 x 1 1/16 in.) Image (2): 20.7 x 9.8cm (8 1/8 x 3 7/8 in.) Image (3): 16.8 x 2.7cm (6 5/8 x 1 1/16 in.) Frame: 34 x 28.5 x .5cm (13 3/8 x 11 1/4 in.) The Clarence H. White Collection, assembled and organised by Professor Clarence H. White Jr., and given in memory of Lewis F. White, Dr. Maynard P. White Sr., and Clarence H. White Jr., the sons of Clarence H. White Sr. and Jane Felix White
Arthur Wesley Dow (American, 1857-1922) Spring Landscape 1892 Oil on canvas University of Michigan Museum of Art
Clarence H. White (American, 1871-1925) The Orchard 1902 Palladium print 24.3 x 19.1cm (9 9/16 x 7 1/2 in.)
Clarence H. White (American, 1871-1925) What shall I say? 1896, printed after 1917 Palladium print Image: 14.8 × 17.3cm (5 13/16 × 6 13/16 in.) Frame: 43.8 × 36.2 × 3.2cm (17 1/4 × 14 1/4 × 1 1/4 in.) The Clarence H. White Collection, assembled and organised by Professor Clarence H. White Jr., and given in memory of Lewis F. White, Dr. Maynard P. White Sr., and Clarence H. White Jr., the sons of Clarence H. White Sr. and Jane Felix White
Clarence H. White (American, 1871-1925) Girl with Mirror 1898 Varnished palladium print George Eastman Museum, purchase
Clarence H. White (American, 1871-1925) Evening Interior c. 1899 Platinum print
Clarence H. White (American, 1871-1925) Untitled [Male academic nude] c. 1900 Waxed platinum print Image: 22.7 x 14.7cm (8 15/16 x 5 13/16 in.) Frame: 51.4 × 41.3 × 3.2cm (20 1/4 × 16 1/4 × 1 1/4 in.) The Clarence H. White Collection, assembled and organised by Professor Clarence H. White Jr., and given in memory of Lewis F. White, Dr. Maynard P. White Sr., and Clarence H. White Jr., the sons of Clarence H. White Sr. and Jane Felix White
Clarence H. White (American, 1871-1925) The Ring Toss 1899 Palladium print
Clarence H. White (American, 1871-1925) Untitled [Portrait of F. Holland Day with Male Nude] 1902 Platinum print 24.2 x 18.8cm (9 1/2 x 7 3/8 in.) Gilman Collection, Purchase, Harriette and Noel Levine Gift, 2005 The Metropolitan Museum of Art
Clarence H. White (American, 1871-1925) Untitled [F. Holland Day lighting a cigarette] 1902 Cyanotype Image: 24.2 x 19.2cm (9 1/2 x 7 9/16 in.) Frame: 43.8 × 36.2 × 3.2cm (17 1/4 × 14 1/4 × 1 1/4 in.) The Clarence H. White Collection, assembled and organised by Professor Clarence H. White Jr., and given in memory of Lewis F. White, Dr. Maynard P. White Sr., and Clarence H. White Jr., the sons of Clarence H. White Sr. and Jane Felix White
Clarence H. White (American, 1871-1925) The Boy with His Wagon [1/3] 1898 Platinum print Sheet: 17.7 x 15.5cm (6 15/16 x 6 1/8 in.) The Clarence H. White Collection, assembled and organised by Professor Clarence H. White Jr., and given in memory of Lewis F. White, Dr. Maynard P. White Sr., and Clarence H. White Jr., the sons of Clarence H. White Sr. and Jane Felix White
Clarence H. White (American, 1871-1925) “Blindman’s Bluff” 1898 Platinum print Library of Congress
Clarence H. White (American, 1871-1925) Drops of Rain 1903 Platinum print Image: 21.1 × 16.2cm (8 5/16 × 6 3/8 in.) Frame: 51.4 × 41.3 × 3.2cm (20 1/4 × 16 1/4 × 1 1/4 in.) The Clarence H. White Collection, assembled and organised by Professor Clarence H. White Jr., and given in memory of Lewis F. White, Dr. Maynard P. White Sr., and Clarence H. White Jr., the sons of Clarence H. White Sr. and Jane Felix White
Clarence H. White (American, 1871-1925) Winter Landscape 1903 Photogravure
Leon Dabo (July 9, 1864 – November 7, 1960) was an American tonalist landscape artist best known for his paintings of New York, particularly the Hudson Valley. His paintings were known for their feeling of spaciousness, with large areas of the canvas that had little but land, sea, or clouds. During his peak, he was considered a master of his art, earning praise from such luminaries as John Spargo, Bliss Carman, Benjamin De Casseres, Edwin Markham, and Anatole Le Braz. His brother, Scott Dabo, was also a noted painter.
Clarence H. White (American, 1871-1925) Unpublished illustration [Beacon Rock with home of E. D. Morgan III] for Gouverneur Morris, “Newport the Maligned” 1907 Platinum print Image: 23.9 x 19.2cm (9 7/16 x 7 9/16 in.) Frame: 51.4 × 41.3 × 3.2cm (20 1/4 × 16 1/4 × 1 1/4 in.) The Clarence H. White Collection, assembled and organised by Professor Clarence H. White Jr., and given in memory of Lewis F. White, Dr. Maynard P. White Sr., and Clarence H. White Jr., the sons of Clarence H. White Sr. and Jane Felix White
Clarence H. White (American, 1871-1925) The Sea (Rose Pastor Stokes, Caritas Island, Connecticut) 1909 Platinum print The Clarence H. White Collection, Princeton University Art Museum
Clarence H. White (American, 1871-1925) “At the Edge of the Woods – Evening” [Letitia Felix] 1901 Chine-collé photogravure 14.4 x 10.1cm 28.6 x 19.6cm uncut Camera Notes, Vol. IV, April 1901
Clarence H. White (American, 1871-1925) Untitled [Jean Reynolds in Newark, Ohio] c. 1905 Gum bichromate print Image: 24.1 x 19cm (9 1/2 x 7 1/2 in.) Frame: 43.8 × 36.2cm (17 1/4 × 14 1/4 in.) The Clarence H. White Collection, assembled and organised by Professor Clarence H. White Jr., and given in memory of Lewis F. White, Dr. Maynard P. White Sr., and Clarence H. White Jr., the sons of Clarence H. White Sr. and Jane Felix White
Clarence H. White (American, 1871-1925) Mother was living in the old home alone 1902 Photogravure From the book Eben Holden, John Andrew & Son (Boston) 1903
Clarence H. White (American, 1871-1925) Untitled [Interior of Weiant house, Newark, Ohio] 1904 Platinum print Image: 15.6 x 19.6cm (6 1/8 x 7 11/16 in.) Frame: 36.2 × 43.8 × 3.2cm (14 1/4 × 17 1/4 × 1 1/4 in.) Gift of Edmund T. Weiant
Clarence H. White (American, 1871-1925) and Paul Burty Haviland (French, 1880-1950) Untitled [Florence Peterson] 1909, printed after 1917 Palladium print Image: 25.6 x 19.6cm (10 1/16 x 7 11/16 in.) Frame: 51.4 × 41.3 × 3.2cm (20 1/4 × 16 1/4 × 1 1/4 in.) The Clarence H. White Collection, assembled and organised by Professor Clarence H. White Jr., and given in memory of Lewis F. White, Dr. Maynard P. White Sr., and Clarence H. White Jr., the sons of Clarence H. White Sr. and Jane Felix White
Clarence H. White (American, 1871-1925) Morning – The Bathroom 1906 Platinum print 22.3 x 18.0cm (8 3/4 x 7 1/16 in.) Alfred Stieglitz Collection, 1933 The Metropolitan Museum of Art
Alfred Stieglitz (American, 1864-1946) and Clarence H. White (American, 1871-1925) “Experiment 28” 1907 Vintage japanese tissue photogravure 20.6 x 15.9cm 30.2 x 21.1cm uncut Published in Camera Work XXVII, 1909
In 1907, the year after Clarence White arrived in New York City, he collaborated with Photo-Secession founder Alfred Stieglitz on a series of portraits featuring two models. Shown here holding a glass globe, California model Mabel Cramer poses in a portrait later reproduced as a plate in Camera Work. Said to be a friend of the German American photographer Arnold Genthe and possessing a face worthy of Cleopatra, Cramer and a woman known only as a Miss Thompson, posed for a series of photographs intended to promote photography as an equivalent medium to painting. It was the only time Stieglitz would ever work in tandem with another photographer and shows the extent to which the photographers were allied aesthetically and technically.
Alfred Stieglitz (American, 1864-1946) and Clarence H. White (American, 1871-1925) Untitled [Miss Thompson] 1907 Platinum print Image: 23.7 x 18.4cm (9 5/16 x 7 1/4 in.) Frame: 43.8 × 36.2 × 3.2cm (17 1/4 × 14 1/4 × 1 1/4 in.) The Clarence H. White Collection, assembled and organised by Professor Clarence H. White Jr., and given in memory of Lewis F. White, Dr. Maynard P. White Sr., and Clarence H. White Jr., the sons of Clarence H. White Sr. and Jane Felix White
Also in 1910, Stieglitz led an effort to create a major exhibition of the Photo-Secession artists at what was then called the Albright Gallery in Buffalo, New York (now known as the Albright-Knox Art Gallery). While this effort was announced as a group activity of the Photo-Secession, Stieglitz refused to allow any others to have input or make decision about who would be included in the exhibition and how it would be displayed. Stieglitz, who was already known for his domineering ways and dogmatic approach to photography, took his self-assigned, unilateral authority even beyond his past actions; in this case he proved to have gone too far for several people who had been closely aligned with him. First Käsebier, then White and finally Steichen broke off their relationship with Stieglitz, each citing Stieglitz’s overbearing ego, his refusal to consider other’s viewpoints and his repeated actions on behalf of the Photo-Secession without consulting any of the so-called “members” of the group.
Stieglitz reacted to these claims and White’s departure in particular with his usual antagonistic manner. Within a short while, he delivered to White most of the negatives and prints he had jointly produced with White in 1907. The split between the two was so deep that Stieglitz wrote to White “One thing I do demand… is that my name not be mentioned by you in connection with either the prints or the negatives… Unfortunately I cannot wipe out the past…” …
Although White and Stieglitz had tried to reconcile their differences before White died, Stieglitz never forgave White for breaking from him in 1912. Upon hearing about White’s untimely death, Stieglitz wrote to Kuehn, “Poor White. Cares and vexation. When I last saw him he told me he was not able to cope with [life as well as he was] twenty years ago. I reminded him that I warned him to stay in business in Ohio – New York would be too much for him. But the Photo-Session beckoned. Vanity and ambitions. His photography went to the devil.” In spite of these words, Stieglitz had 49 of White’s photographs, including 18 created jointly with Stieglitz, in his personal collection when he died.
Alfred Stieglitz (American, 1864-1946) and Clarence H. White (American, 1871-1925) Torso 1907 Platinum print 22.1 x 18.7cm (8 11/16 x 7 3/8 in.) Alfred Stieglitz Collection, 1933 The Metropolitan Museum of Art
In 1907 White and Stieglitz collaborated on a series of nude studies in which they planned to experiment with various lenses and papers. Stieglitz placed the camera and choreographed the poses, much as he would later do in his extensive portrait of Georgia O’Keeffe, while White focused the camera and developed the negatives. These three photographs illustrate the range of the imagery and its progression from the most formal and demure image in which the draped Miss Thompson assumes a cool classical pose to the second image which is surprisingly intimate and unaffected. Combining the compositional strength and naturalism of the first two photographs, but exchanging props and interior surroundings for tight framing and expressive chiaroscuro, the third and most accomplished photograph is both modern and sensual.
Text from The Metropolitan Museum of Art website
Clarence H. White (American, 1871-1925) Untitled [Florence Peterson] c. 1909 Platinum print Image (arched top): 22.5 x 16.5cm (8 7/8 x 6 1/2 in.) Frame: 51.4 × 41.3 × 3.2cm (20 1/4 × 16 1/4 × 1 1/4 in.) The Clarence H. White Collection, assembled and organised by Professor Clarence H. White Jr., and given in memory of Lewis F. White, Dr. Maynard P. White Sr., and Clarence H. White Jr., the sons of Clarence H. White Sr. and Jane Felix White
Clarence H. White (American, 1871-1925) Morning 1905 Platinum print From Camera Work (No. 23, July 1908)
Morning perfectly embodies the tenets of Pictorialism: expressive, rather than narrative or documentary, content; craftsmanship in the execution of the print; and a carefully constructed composition allied to Impressionist and American Tonalist painting and to popular Japanese prints. His photographs from the period before he moved to New York in 1906 signalled a remove from the modern urban world. Neither genre scene nor narrative tableau, this photograph is a retreat into domesticised nature.
Text from The Metropolitan Museum of Art website
Clarence H. White (American, 1871-1925) Eugene Debs c. 1906-1908 Platinum print Image: 22.2 x 17.8cm (8 3/4 x 7 in.) Frame: 51.4 × 41.3 × 3.2cm (20 1/4 × 16 1/4 × 1 1/4 in.) The Clarence H. White Collection, assembled and organised by Professor Clarence H. White Jr., and given in memory of Lewis F. White, Dr. Maynard P. White Sr., and Clarence H. White Jr., the sons of Clarence H. White Sr. and Jane Felix White
Eugene Debs (American, 1855-1926)
Eugene Victor Debs (November 5, 1855 – October 20, 1926) was an American union leader, one of the founding members of the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW or the Wobblies), and five times the candidate of the Socialist Party of America for President of the United States. Through his presidential candidacies, as well as his work with labor movements, Debs eventually became one of the best-known socialists living in the United States. …
Debs ran as a Socialist candidate for President of the United States five times, including 1900 (earning 0.63% of the popular vote), 1904 (2.98%), 1908 (2.83%), 1912 (5.99%), and 1920 (3.41%), the last time from a prison cell. He was also a candidate for United States Congress from his native state Indiana in 1916.
Debs was noted for his oratory, and his speech denouncing American participation in World War I led to his second arrest in 1918. He was convicted under the Sedition Act of 1918 and sentenced to a term of 10 years. President Warren G. Harding commuted his sentence in December 1921. Debs died in 1926, not long after being admitted to a sanatorium due to cardiovascular problems that developed during his time in prison. He has since been cited as the inspiration for numerous politicians.
Clarence H. White (American, 1871-1925) Alfred Stieglitz 1907 Cyanotype Image: 24.2 x 19.2cm (9 1/2 x 7 9/16 in.) Frame: 43.8 × 36.2 × 3.2cm (17 1/4 × 14 1/4 × 1 1/4 in.) The Clarence H. White Collection, assembled and organised by Professor Clarence H. White Jr., and given in memory of Lewis F. White, Dr. Maynard P. White Sr., and Clarence H. White Jr., the sons of Clarence H. White Sr. and Jane Felix White
Clarence H. White (American, 1871-1925) Portrait of Arthur Wesley Dow 1908 Vintage waxed platinum print 22.1 x 16.6cm
“White was hired by Arthur Wesley Dow at Teachers College in 1907 and shared Dow’s philosophy that students of the fine and the applied arts should have the same fundamental training based on design principles (anticipating the approach of the Bauhaus in the 1920s).”
Arthur Wesley Dow (American, 1857-1922)
Arthur Wesley Dow (April 6, 1857 – December 13, 1922) was an American painter, printmaker, photographer and influential arts educator.
Dow taught at three major American arts training institutions over the course of his career beginning with the Pratt Institute from 1896-1903 and the New York Art Students League from 1898-1903; then, in 1900, he founded and served as the director of the Ipswich Summer School of Art in Ipswich, Massachusetts, and from 1904 to 1922, he was a professor of fine arts at Columbia University Teachers College.
His ideas were quite revolutionary for the period; he taught that rather than copying nature, art should be created by elements of the composition, like line, mass and colour. He wanted leaders of the public to see art is a living force in everyday life for all, not a sort of traditional ornament for the few. Dow suggested this lack of interest would improve if the way art was presented would permit self-expression and include personal experience in creating art.
Clarence H. White (American, 1871-1925) Clarence H. White c. 1908-1910 Autochrome 17.5 x 12.5cm The Clarence H. White Collection, assembled and organised by Professor Clarence H. White Jr., and given in memory of Lewis F. White, Dr. Maynard P. White Sr., and Clarence H. White Jr., the sons of Clarence H. White Sr. and Jane Felix White
In the decade after the invention of the Kodak point-and-shoot camera in 1888, thousands of men and women began taking their own amateur photographs. Some of them, generally from educated backgrounds and interested in the fine arts, aspired to make aesthetically pleasing images that rivalled paintings and prints in their compositions and tonal effects. These serious photographers, favouring large-format view cameras on tripods, called themselves pictorialists, which merely meant that they were concerned with making artistic “picture” rather than documents.
One of the most successful and influential of these self-taught amateurs was Clarence H. White (1871-1925), who rose from modest origins in Newark, Ohio, to become an internationally known art photographer and teacher. Clarence H. White and His World: The Art and Craft of Photography, 1895-1925 celebrates the short-lived career of this dedicated visionary, which spans the turbulent era from the Gilded Age through the 1913 Armory Show to the Roaring Twenties.
Drawing primarily on the vast collection of prints and archival material acquired by former curator Peter C. Bunnell for the Princeton University Art Museum and from the Library of Congress’s White Family Collection, the exhibition also includes photographs by White’s friends – such as Alvin Langdon Coburn, F. Holland Day, and Gertrude Käsebier – and works by a sampling of the hundreds of students who White trained at Columbia Teachers College, the Brooklyn Institute of Arts and Sciences, and the schools he founded in New York, Maine, and Connecticut. Complementing more than 140 rare photographic prints, illustrated books, and albums are paintings and drawings by John White Alexander, Léon Dabo, Thomas Wilmer Dewing, Arthur Wesley Dow, Alice Barber Stephens, Edmund Charles Tarbell, Max Weber, and Marius de Zayas that illuminate the artistic milieu in which White’s style evolved.
White’s early career centers on his Midwestern hometown, where he took up the camera in 1894. Squeezing photographic sittings into the spare time he had from his job as a bookkeeper for a wholesale grocer, he dressed his wife, her sisters, and his friends in costumes evocative of the colonial or antebellum era and posed them in penumbral interiors or the twilit hills outside Newark. White’s knack for setting up tableaux that were at once naturalistic and yet formally striking won him prizes in regional exhibitions, followed by his acceptance in 1898 in the exclusive group show of art photographs held at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts. His meeting there with Alfred Stieglitz, F. Holland Day, Gertrude Käsebier, and others led to his participation in international exhibitions and his eventual inclusion as a founding member of the group that Stieglitz in 1902 dubbed the “Photo-Secession.” White stood out from his contemporaries for his assimilation of the radical cropping and flattened planes of Japanese prints, his melancholy, introspective women, and his frank, unromanticised portrayals of children.
White’s decision in 1904 to become a full-time photographer and his move in 1906 to New York transformed his life and his subjects. While in Newark, he had already earned extra income from commercial jobs illustrating fiction, primarily stories set in frontier America, such as the bestselling novel by Irving Bacheller, Eben Holden: A Tale of the North Country. A section of the exhibition reveals the extent to which White, like many Photo-Secessionists, sold portraits, landscapes, and narrative illustrations to magazines – a practice that has received little attention as a result of Alfred Stieglitz’s renowned dismissal of commercial photography.
Another discovery explored in the exhibition is the importance of socialism for White’s aesthetic vision. White’s selection of handmade printing techniques – such as gum prints in which a pigmented gum emulsion is hand applied to drawing paper – and his transformation of each platinum print (made in contact with a negative) into a unique object are indebted to the ideals of William Morris and the Arts and Crafts movement, which valued hand labor over standardised machine production. White’s deep friendship with the family of Stephen M. Reynolds, Eugene Debs’s campaign manager and a leading Indiana socialist, resulted in idealised portraits of a family that embraced the simple life, racial and social equality, and the philosophy that every object in the home should be harmonious. White also went on to celebrate Rose Pastor Stokes and her husband, Graham Stokes, a socialist power couple in the years prior to the American entry into World War I.
Consistent with many socialists’ embrace of Morris and Walt Whitman, White also accepted the undressed human form as natural and free of sin. Throughout his career he made photographs of nude figures, primarily his sons outdoors and young women posed in the studio or in secluded glens. Drawing upon his greater experience with indoor lighting, White joined with Stieglitz in 1907 for a series of soft-focus studies of female models. A sampling of these prints is reunited here for the first time since 1912, when Stieglitz split with White and disavowed this collaborative venture.
The latter part of the exhibition is devoted to White’s innovations as a teacher, which form a major part of his legacy. White was hired by Arthur Wesley Dow at Teachers College in 1907 and shared Dow’s philosophy that students of the fine and the applied arts should have the same fundamental training based on design principles (anticipating the approach of the Bauhaus in the 1920s). At a time when the few American schools that existed to teach photography focused solely on processes and technique, White assigned more open-ended compositional and exposure problems followed by group critiques. Later, at the Clarence H. White School that he founded in New York in 1914, he hired a series of artists (starting with Max Weber) to teach art history and composition. White’s students – represented here by Anton Bruehl, Laura Gilpin, Paul Burty Haviland, Paul Outerbridge, Karl Struss, Doris Ulmann, and Margaret Watkins, among others – mastered abstract principles of framing, cropping, and lighting that prepared them for a wide array of professional careers, including the growing arenas of advertising and fashion photography.
White’s late works include portraits of famous, but now forgotten, actresses and silent film stars, such as Alla Nazimova and Mae Murray, as well as the painter Abbott Thayer and the art director for Condé Nast, Heyworth Campbell. White also tried his hand at fashion photography and welcomed filmmaking into the White School in the months before he led a summer class to Mexico City, where he tragically succumbed to a heart attack at the age of fifty-four.
Far from rejecting modern styles, White accommodated them in his school, although he maintained his preference for matte printing papers and a degree of soft focus for his personal salon prints. What unites his career, and allows his work to speak to us today, is his belief in the transformative power of art and the potential of every individual to craft objects of lasting beauty.
Anne McCauley David Hunter McAlpin Professor of the History of Photography and Modern Art
Margaret Watkins (1884-1969) was a Canadian photographer who is remembered for her innovative contributions to advertising photography. She lived a life of rebellion, rejection of tradition, and individual heroism; she never married, she was a successful career woman in a time when women stayed at home, and she exhibited eroticism and feminism in her art and writing. …
Watkins opened a studio in Greenwich Village, New York City, and in 1920 became editor of the annual publication Pictorial Photography in America. She worked successfully as an advertising photographer for Macy’s and the J. Walter Thompson Company and Fairfax, becoming one of the first women photographers to contribute to advertising agencies. She also produced landscapes, portraits, nudes and still lifes. While teaching at the Clarence White school from 1916 to 1928, her students included Margaret Bourke-White, Laura Gilpin, Paul Outerbridge, Ralph Steiner and Doris Ulmann.
One of the earliest art photographers in advertising, her images of everyday objects set new standards of acceptability. From 1928, when she was based in Glasgow, she embarked on street photography in Russia, Germany and France, specialising in store fronts and displays. Watkins died in Glasgow, Scotland in 1969, largely forgotten as a photographer.
Watkins legacy exists in her exemplary work left behind, but also her example as a single, successful woman. According to Queen’s Quarterly, her life is an inspiration for single women, who are fulfilled by their careers, rather than the traditional gender roles women face of fulfilment through marrying and having children.
Before she died, Watkins handed over a sealed box of all her work to her neighbour and executor of her will, Joseph Mulholland. She gave him strict instructions to not open it until after she died. As a result, several solo exhibitions were subsequently held in Britain and North America. When she died in November 1969, she left most of her estate to music charities.
In October 2012, a retrospective exhibition of Margaret Watkins’ work titled “Domestic Symphonies” opened at the National Gallery of Canada. This exhibition showcased 95 of her photographs dating from 1914-1939. Of these photos were portraits and landscapes, modern still life, street scenes, advertising work, and commercial designs. Music was a vital inspiration for Watkins, and that can be seen just from the title of this exhibition.
Clarence H. White (American, 1871-1925) Shipbuilding, Bath, Maine 1917 Hand-applied platinum print Image: 12.1 x 9.8cm (4 3/4 x 3 7/8 in.) Frame: 43.8 × 36.2 × 3.2cm (17 1/4 × 14 1/4 × 1 1/4 in.) The Clarence H. White Collection, assembled and organised by Professor Clarence H. White Jr., and given in memory of Lewis F. White, Dr. Maynard P. White Sr., and Clarence H. White Jr., the sons of Clarence H. White Sr. and Jane Felix White
Clarence H. White (American, 1871-1925) Printed by Clarence H. White Jr., American, 1907-1978 Untitled [Dome of the Church of Our Lady of Carmen, San Ángel, Mexico] 1925 Palladium print by Clarence H. White Jr. Image: 21.9 x 17.1cm (8 5/8 x 6 3/4 in.) Frame: 43.8 × 36.2 × 3.2cm (17 1/4 × 14 1/4 × 1 1/4 in.) The Clarence H. White Collection, assembled and organised by Professor Clarence H. White Jr., and given in memory of Lewis F. White, Dr. Maynard P. White Sr., and Clarence H. White Jr., the sons of Clarence H. White Sr. and Jane Felix White
Clarence H. White (American, 1871-1925) Mae Murray c. 1919-20 Platinum print with graphite Image: 24.3 x 14.8cm (9 9/16 x 5 13/16 in.) Frame: 43.8 × 36.2 × 3.2cm (17 1/4 × 14 1/4 × 1 1/4 in.) The Clarence H. White Collection, assembled and organised by Professor Clarence H. White Jr., and given in memory of Lewis F. White, Dr. Maynard P. White Sr., and Clarence H. White Jr., the sons of Clarence H. White Sr. and Jane Felix White
Mae Murray (May 10, 1885 – March 23, 1965) was an American actress, dancer, film producer, and screenwriter. Murray rose to fame during the silent film era and was known as “The Girl with the Bee-Stung Lips” and “The Gardenia of the Screen”.
Clarence H. White (American, 1871-1925) Alla Nazimova 1919 Photogravure Library of Congress
All Nazimova (Russian, 1879-1945)
Alla Nazimova (Russian: Алла Назимова; born Marem-Ides Leventon; June 3 [O.S. May 22], 1879 – July 13, 1945) was a Russian actress who immigrated to the United States in 1905. On Broadway, she was noted for her work in the classic plays of Ibsen, Chekhov and Turgenev. Her efforts at silent film production were less successful, but a few sound-film performances survive as a record of her art. Nazimova openly conducted relationships with women, and her mansion on Hollywood’s Sunset Boulevard was believed to be the scene of outlandish parties. She is credited with having originated the phrase “sewing circle” as a discreet code for lesbian or bisexual actresses.
Clarence H. White (American, 1871-1925) The Dancers – Barnard Greek Games 1922 Palladium print Image: 24.5 x 19.6cm (9 5/8 x 7 11/16 in.) Frame: 43.8 × 36.2 × 3.2cm (17 1/4 × 14 1/4 × 1 1/4 in.) The Clarence H. White Collection, assembled and organised by Professor Clarence H. White Jr., and given in memory of Lewis F. White, Dr. Maynard P. White Sr., and Clarence H. White Jr., the sons of Clarence H. White Sr. and Jane Felix White
The Barnard Greek Games were a tradition at Barnard College pitting the freshman and sophomore classes against one another in a series of competitions. They began in 1903 when the Class of 1905 challenged the Class of 1906 to an informal athletic contest. In later years upperclass students would cheer on their juniors, “odds” cheering for “odds” and “evens” for “evens.” Signature events included a chariot race, with chariots pulled by teams of 4 students, and a torch race. The torch race is captured in the “Spirit of the Greek Games” statue outside Barnard Hall that was given by the Class of 1905 as a gift on the 25th anniversary of the games in 1928. The games, a central part of Barnard campus life, were held annually until 1968, when upheaval on campus caused their cancellation, snuffing out this tradition along with such longstanding features of campus life as the Varsity Show.
After a 22 year absence, the Games were revived in 1989 as part of Barnard’s Centennial celebrations. The games were revived again in 2000, and have been held sporadically since.
Clarence H. White (American, 1871-1925) Heyworth Campbell c. 1921 Hand-applied platinum print Image: 24 x 18.9cm (9 7/16 x 7 7/16 in.) Frame: 51.4 × 41.3 × 3.2cm (20 1/4 × 16 1/4 × 1 1/4 in.) The Clarence H. White Collection, assembled and organised by Professor Clarence H. White Jr., and given in memory of Lewis F. White, Dr. Maynard P. White Sr., and Clarence H. White Jr., the sons of Clarence H. White Sr. and Jane Felix White
Gertrude Käsebier (1852 – 1934) Portrait of Clarence H. White c. 1910 Silver gelatin print Library of Congress
Note: Digital clean and print balance by Dr Marcus Bunyan
Princeton University Art Museum McCormick Hall, Princeton, NJ Phone: (609) 258-3788
The main Museum building is closed for construction of our new Museum, designed by architect Sir David Adjaye and anticipated to open in late 2024.
WARNING: Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander readers are warned that the following posting may contain images of deceased persons.
Unknown photographer George St. from King St., Sydney Nd
The last posting of the year, because I am feeling rather exhausted!
Down the rabbit holewe go… into the world of Australian historical photography.
In photographs that were taken around the same time, the contrast could not be more evident: horse and trap travelling down fashionable George Street, Sydney while donkey and cart in Outback Australia fetch water; Nicholas Caire’s King Billy’s camp in McCree’s Paddock, Maloga, Victoria – King Billy ‘The Last of His Tribe’, the final remnant of a dying race and J. W. Lindt’s Untitled (Two men in rural Victoria), old men with beards and hats, swag and billy, possibly itinerant travelling workers.
And so I have sequenced these images as best I could.
The white men stand implacably outside the courthouses while the Indigenous feet touch the earth. They fight for their country, win the Military Medal and can’t even vote. The courthouses of the colonial white, those massive edifices of the law, jurisdiction and punishment tied with Australian Aborigines in chains and Aboriginal youth Dylan Voller, 17, shackled to a metal chair by his hands, feet and neck and wearing a spithood at Don Dale Youth Detention Centre in 2015.
And so it goes…
Although there can be many contexts and interpretations within the photographic labyrinthine abyss, and even though these photographs were taken by colonial masters, the materiality of photography (as act of creation and as final printed product) and its relationship to the real is what is important here. These are beautiful photographs of peoples from the First Nations, people that all have their own specific names, and in many instances, speak / spoke their own specific language.
You only have to look at the boy standing at the back of the photograph Aboriginal family group to recognise how his direct looking transcends the fixed gaze of the camera, the male gaze, the white gaze and the colonial gaze. His gaze, his return of serve if you like, speaks to us through time – of an individual, valuable and empowered human being assured in his own self. No colour, jurisdiction nor race is necessary for us recognise him as such.
Dr Marcus Bunyan
Many thankx to Dennis Joachim for allowing me to publish the photographs in the posting. Please click on the photographs for a larger version of the image.
“Think carefully: there can be no redundancy in photography, for a photograph, whatever it is, already speaks twice of time, once to seize it and another to say that it has passed; And there can be no trompe-l’oeil in it either; it is and will always be the mise en abyme par excellence; It is the mind that looks at the abyss, it is a piece of the abyss cut clear, with four right angles cut terribly sharp.”
Trompe-l’œil (French for “deceive the eye”) is an art technique that uses realistic imagery to create the optical illusion that the depicted objects exist in three dimensions. It refers to perspectival illusionism.
Mise en abyme
Mise en abyme is a French term derived from heraldry, and literally means “placed into abyss”. A common sense of the phrase is the visual experience of standing between two mirrors, then seeing as a result an infinite reproduction of one’s image. Another is the Droste effect, in which a picture appears within itself, in a place where a similar picture would realistically be expected to appear… In Western art history, “mise en abyme” is a formal technique in which an image contains a smaller copy of itself, in a sequence appearing to recur infinitely; “recursive” is another term for this.
Unknown photographer Richmond Courthouse, Courthouses of New South Wales c. 1870-1880s Date built: 1877
Richmond is a town in New South Wales, in the local government area of the City of Hawkesbury. It is located on the alluvial Hawkesbury River flats, at the foot of the Blue Mountains. It is about 65 km by road from Sydney.
Richmond Court House and Police Station is located at 288 Windsor Street, Richmond NSW. The present building was designed by Colonial Architect, James Barnet in 1877 as a court house with associated police station. The front entrance is via an attractive arched colonnade with feature brickwork and the roof is supported by bracketed eaves. The raised roof of the court room may be seen in the centre of the structure. Note the similarity in style with the adjacent former post office, also the work of James Barnet. It replaced the watch-house built by William Cox in 1827. The watch-house was a four roomed structure with a detached kitchen. One of the rooms was barred and secure for the custody of prisoners. The other rooms were for the policeman on duty. The rear of the site was set aside for the first stock pound in the town. The court house is still in use but the Police Local Area Command is located in the nearby town of Windsor.
Alphonse Chargois (French, 1860-1936) Cumjam Murdered Ferguson at Mentana March 1894 1894 Albumen print 16 x 10 inches
Chargois, Alphonse. (father of Herbert Chargois. died Nov 1936) Townsville, Qld 1879 Croydon, Qld 1892-1896 Normanton, Qld 1896-1897 Townsville, Qld 1897 McArthur St, Croydon Qld (base) 1898-1913 Georgetown, Qld (trav) 1900 Torres Strait Islands, Qld (trav) Oct 1913 “Touring the South” 1913-1915 (owned Bicycle Business, Warwick, Qld, 1915, advertised for sale Feb 1915) “Royal Studio” “late Lyne Brown, McTaggart and Dobson” Lake St, Cairns, Qld July 1915-1936 (bought McTaggart & Dobson’s studio, July 1915) Mareeba, Qld (trav) Oct 1915 (estate publicly Auctioned up Oct 1947)
Cumjam standing in front of a government issue tent. Cumjam was arrested for the murder of Mr Ferguson (aged 60) who worked for Donald Mclntyre at Mentana Station. Ferguson’s murder and the capture of Cumjam were reported widely in the Norman Chronicle, The North Queensland Register and The Brisbane Courier between 1894-1895. Records detailing the outcome of his arrest have not been located.
“An Aboriginal Desperado”
The “Norman Chronicle” says: “By the last mail we received from Mr. Chargois, who is at present at Delta, two photos of the blackboy “Cumjam.” who is supposed to have murdered Ferguson at Mentana in March, 1894. The details of the capture as given by Mr. Chargois are as follows: ‘Mr Jack Adford, who has been managing Loch-na-gar for Mr. McInytre, had received instructions to move cattle to Daigonally, and wishing to bring over with him some of the native curios, he told the blacks, ‘Me go away by-and-by take away altogether bullock, you fetch ’em up spear, shell, boomerang, me give you tumbac. Me come back one moon.’ One moon goes by and the blacks were there to the number of about 50, eager to exchange their native gear for tobacco. All were up at the station except one, who stayed at the camp, and Jack Alford, wishing to know why he do so, asked the others, ‘What name boy sit down longa camp?’ ‘That fellow name ‘Cumjam’; he sick long a cobra.’ Alford at once recognised the murdered of Ferguson, although he gave no sign of his discovery, but said to the other, ‘Poor fellow, you go fetch em up, me give him medicine make him alright.’ ‘Cumjam’ was accordingly conducted up. ‘What name belongs you?’ said Alford. ‘Cumjam,’ replied the black. Alford decided at once upon his plan of action, told the other blacks to step back and site down, then taking Cumjam aside he seized him and with the help of his own boys bound him up. The other blacks, not liking the look of things, began to get uneasy, and slipped away one by one down to the creek, leaving Cumjam captured. It was no easy task to bring him along. He ate through one strap, and when that was replaced by a chain and padlock he managed somehow to pick the latter to pieces.’ The photo which we have on view shows the prisoner to be securely bound.”
The North Queensland Register 16 October 1895
Text from the Thagaalbi: History of Australia’s Indigenous people Facebook page [Online] Cited 19/12/2017
The presence of Europeans along the gulf coast and south-western areas of the Peninsula was met with Aboriginal resistance. When J.T. Embley surveyed the Mitchell River in 1886-1887 he counted “skirmishes with the blacks” to have been the cause of delays in the completion of his work.136 The death of Ferguson, an elderly white stockman, in March 1894 followed his spearing on Mentana station by the Aboriginal, Cumjam.137 Only a few months before Ferguson’s death one party of survivors of the steamship, Kanahooka, after its capsize off the Mitchell River in January 1894, were able to make their way through the Kokobera country through to safety at Mentana station.138 This was despite popular fears that they would be exposed to the “hostility of the blacks”.139
Unknown photographer Windsor Courthouse, Courthouses of New South Wales c. 1870-1880s Date built: 1821
Windsor is a town lying North-West of Sydney, New South Wales, Australia. Windsor is located in the local government area of the City of Hawkesbury. It sits on the Hawkesbury River, on the north-western outskirts of the Sydney metropolitan area.
Windsor Courthouse is a rare surviving Colonial Georgian public building that originally dates from the early nineteenth century. The building has a fine and impressive form which uses an adapted Palladian plan to suit the Australian climate. It is of considerable historical, social and aesthetic significance as one of the earliest surviving courthouse buildings in Australia. The courthouse now [1967] ranks as Greenway’s best preserved building. The Building and Maintenance Branch of the NSW Department of Public Works carried out restoration work in 1961 to remove unsympathetic rendering of the external brickwork which was an attempt to reduce the problem of damp. The building now stands in its original and unspoiled form in Windsor, the most prosperous and successful of the towns then founded by Governor Macquarie. The courthouse was insisted upon by Governor Macquarie, designed by Greenway (himself originally a convict) and built for A₤1,800 by William Cox, using convict labour. It is a combination and the result of all the forces directly at play during the Australia’s early development. The oldest existing local court in New South Wales. Cox later served at Windsor as a magistrate.
Unknown photographer Pitt St. looking S. from Bridge St., Sydney 1895 Albumen print
Unknown photographer Getting Water 1892 Albumen prints
Unknown photographer “At the well” Station Hands 1892 Albumen print
Unknown photographer Untitled [Aboriginal ceremony] c. 1892 Albumen print
Unknown photographer Court House Bathurst N S Wales, Courthouses of New South Wales c. 1870-1880s Date built: 1880
Bathurst is a regional city in the Central Tablelands of New South Wales, Australia. It is about 200 kilometres north-west of Sydney.
Bathurst Courthouse is one of the finest Victorian Court House buildings in New South Wales. Built as part of a precinct of Victorian public buildings, it is a landmark building prominently sited in the town centre of Bathurst. The building has a lengthy association with the provision of justice in the district. The wings, built as the postal and telegraph offices, were opened in 1877. The entire structure is 81 metres (266 ft) long and 45 metres (148 ft) wide. The west wing is now occupied by the Central Western Music Centre. The east wing is now the Historical Society Museum.
Nicholas Caire (Australian, 1837-1918) King Billy Maloga (King Billy’s camp in McCree’s Paddock, Maloga, Victoria) 1891
Photograph of four Aboriginal Australians, two men and two women, seated on ground in front of a shelter. Older man on left holds wooden sticks or spears, and a dog sits next to him. The three main local tribes were named after their “country” (or district), being “Burrumbeet” from Lakes Burrumbeet and Learmonth, “Keyeet” from Mt Buninyong and “Tooloora” from Mt Warrenheip and Lal Lal Creek. The last well recognised leader of the district, was “King Billy” from Burrumbeet, whose death surprisingly made the newspapers in mining areas and big cities right round the country.
Ballarat’s Mullawallah (also known as King Billy or Frank Wilson), was buried in 1896 to considerable civic interest as a result of being nominated as ‘The Last of His Tribe’.
J. W. Lindt (John William, Australian 1845-1926, Melbourne, photographer) Untitled [Two men in rural Victoria] c. 1880s Cabinet card Albumen print
John William Lindt (1845-1926), photographer, was born at Frankfurt on Main, Germany, son of Peter Joseph Lindt, excise officer, and his wife Justine, née Rambach. At 17 he ran away to sea and joined a Dutch sailing ship. He deserted at Brisbane; by 1863 he was at Grafton as a piano-tuner and then worked in a photographic studio. He visited Germany in 1867 and on his return bought the business. Using the wet-plate process he photographed the Clarence River district and its Aboriginals, producing albums in 1875 and 1876. He then sold out and went to Melbourne where he opened a studio in Collins Street. He soon won repute for his society, theatre and landscape photographs. In 1880 he photographed the capture of the Kelly gang at Glenrowan. When the first commercial dry plates arrived in Melbourne he went to Europe to seek agencies for the latest photographic equipment. On his return he worked in the studio and the Victorian countryside; many of his photographs were used in the railways. He also designed and modified cameras as well as ‘advising in matters photographic’.
Unknown photographer Darlinghurst Gaol & Court House, Sydney Oct. 1870 1870 Date built: 1844
The Darlinghurst Court House and residence is the finest, and only erudite Old Colonial Grecian public building complex surviving in Australia. Commenced in the 1830s, it has a long and continual association with the provision of law and order along with the neighbouring Darlinghurst Gaol complex. The imposing sandstone building is prominently sited at Taylor Square. The Court House, designed by Lewis and built between 1837 and 1844, is the first purpose designed court house to be built in NSW. The pavilions on either side were designed by Barnet around 1886. The extension facing Victoria Street was designed by the Government Architect’s Office and completed c. 1963. The central block was adapted from an 1823 design in Peter Nicholson’s ‘The New Practical Builder’.
Unknown photographer Untitled [Australian Aborigines in chains] Nd Albumen print
Aboriginal youth Dylan Voller, 17, shackled to a metal chair by his hands, feet and neck and wearing a spithood at Don Dale Youth Detention Centre in 2015
Unknown photographer Unknown Courthouse, Courthouses of New South Wales c. 1870-1880s
Unknown photographer Untitled [Aboriginal man smoking a pipe] Nd
Unknown photographer Untitled [Aboriginal making fire] Nd
Anonymous photographer Untitled [Aboriginal with spear] Nd
Edwards & Errington (Adelaide, South Australia) Studio portrait of 2597 Private (Pte) Frederick Prentice, 12th Battalion, and later 1st Australian Pioneer Battalion (detail) c. 1914-1918 Gelatin silver print on postcard
Northern Territory born WWI veteran Frederick Prentice, an Indigenous serviceman who won the Military Medal. On the verso of the photograph is an original message “Just a little card to remember the good times at Paratoo.” This postcard was sent to a friend, Gertrude Fitzgerald, who he knew at Paratoo, SA. Born in Powells Creek, Northern, NT, on 18 January 1894, Frederick Prentice was educated at Kyre College (later part of Scotch College), Adelaide, from 1905 to 1908. Following schooling, Prentice worked as a station hand and was employed at Manunda Station, South Australia at the time of his enlistment on 7 May 1915 in Keswick. Pte Prentice won a Military Medal for his actions on 19 July 1916 at Pozieres, France, where he showed great courage, resource and ability in bringing machine guns and ammunition through the enemy barrage in the dark and across broken ground. Frederick Prentice returned to Australia as a Corporal on 12 May 1919.
Anonymous photographer Untitled [Aboriginal with scars] Nd
Kerry & Co., (Sydney) Aboriginal chief c. 1900-1917 Collotype 13.7 × 8.5cm (image and sheet)
Portrait of Aboriginal chief, Barron River, Queensland, with body paint and head decorations, in ceremonial dress.
Unknown photographer Court House Orange N.S.W., Courthouses of New South Wales c. 1870-1880s Date built: 1883
“On a site where local Wiradjuri people are said to have once held corroborees stands the Orange court House. A slab and bark watch-house was erected in 1849 and used as a court house from 1851. Early church services and the first council meetings were held. A larger sandstone Court House was erected in 1860-62 by Kennard and Snow. Bushranger Ben Hall was tried here in the early 1860s. This building made way for the present Neo-classical building designed by James Barnet in 1883. A new wing was constructed a the rear of the site in 2001.”
~ Orange Heritage Trail, a pamphlet produced by Ross Maroney in conjunction with the Orange City Council, the Orange Visitor Information Centre.
. The current Orange Courthouse building was designed by the Colonial Government Architect James Barnet. Construction was completed in 1883. Previous buildings existed on the site, the first being erected in 1847, around the time of the town’s settlement, and operated as a Court of Petty Sessions, being the usual arrangements in those times. Orange was proclaimed a municipality in 1860, the first meeting being held in the Courthouse, located on the same site as today, but a different structure.
Text from the Willshub website 2 Jan 2015 [Online] Cited 20th November 2017
Publisher: Karl Robert Langewiesche Vlg. Königstein, 1928. 112 pages, numerous illustrations. Pictures of Isadora Duncan, Nijinski, Anna Pavlova, Alexander Sacharoff, Clotilde von Derp-Sacharoff, Die Schwestern Wiesenthal, Tamara Karsavina, La Argentina, Ellen Petz, Niddy Impekoven, Rudolf von Laban, Mary Wigman, Palucca, Harald Kreutzberg, Javanische Tanzgruppe. Language: German
A performance by the Natural Dance Movement in silk robes, England c. 2000 Photograph taken by my mother
I have always loved dancing… it comes from the soul. I have danced since 1975 – pre-disco, through disco, high energy, new romantics, soul, trance, techno and more. I still go out dancing today. While this is a different kind of dance, notably free dance, all forms of dance are a connection to music, earth, cosmos. A connection to the earliest of human beings dancing round an open fire.
This is a book I bought on the Internet for $12. I have scanned the photographs and given them a digital clean. The costumes are fabulous, the poses exquisite, exotic, and joyous. The silhouettes and shapes created are just glorious. The photographs usually have low depth of field, the figures “caught” in front of contextless backgrounds. But as Grete Wiesenthal’s assistant Maria Josefa Schaffgotsch observes, the time freeze of the photograph is the antithesis of free dance:
“Grete Wiesnethal’s primary concern was to overcome as far as possible the unavoidable static element of classical dance and to dissolve everything that smacked of a pose in a never-ending stream of movement. The flowing, swinging, wavelike three-four rhythm, transforming Strauss’s waltzes into movement – that was her particular art, that was what made her world famous.”1
Many of the photographs work against the nature of the medium, and the idea of posing for the camera, to capture the fleeting expressiveness of dance. Just look at the ecstatic shape created in Hugo Erfurth’s Schwestern Wiesenthal (Wiesenthal sisters) (c. 1928, below). Indeed, the language of spiritual revelation!
My favourites are the photographs of Sent M’Ahesa and Nijinski. But honestly, they are all glorious. The photographs in this book, “The Artistic Dance of Our Time,” represent the cutting edge of dance, art, and photography in 1928. It is so nice to seem them now.
Dr Marcus Bunyan
1/ Andrea Amort. “Free Dance in Interwar Vienna,” in Deborah Holmes and Lisa Silverman (eds.,). Interwar Vienna: Culture Between Tradition and Modernity. Rochester, New York: Camden House, 2009, p. 123.
Please click on the photographs for a larger version of the image.
Hermann and Marianne Aubel (authors) Karl Robert Langewiesche (publisher) Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit [The Artistic Dance of Our Time] 1928 Book front cover
Free dance
Free dance is a 20th-century dance form that preceded modern dance. Rebelling against the rigid constraints of classical ballet, Loie Fuller, Isadora Duncan and Ruth St. Denis (with her work in theatre) developed their own styles of free dance and laid the foundations of American modern dance with their choreography and teaching. In Europe Rudolf Laban, Emile Jaques-Dalcroze and François Delsarte developed their own theories of human movement and methods of instruction that led to the development of European modern and Expressionist dance.
Free dance was prolific in Central and Eastern Europe, where national schools were created, such as the School of Musical Movement (Heptachor), in Russia, and the Orkesztika School, in Hungary.
Elvira (Munich) Isadora Duncan From Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit [The Artistic Dance of Our Time] p. 1 Published 1928
“Wir sehen das Ziel der Tanzkunst und jeder Kunst darin, eine Sprache geistiger Offenbarung zu sein, aus der Natur heraus sich äubernd und mit ihr verbunden.”
“We see the goal of dance and every art as being a language of spiritual revelation, external to and connected with it.”
Hermann and Marianne Aubel
Vielleicht auf keinem Gebiet kunstlerischer Entfaltung haben die letzten Jahrsehute ein solches Strebennach Weiterentwicklung gebracht, wie auf dem Gebiete der Tanzkunst. Sie ist, als letztes Zile der Arbeit an der menschilchen Bewegung, mehr und mehr mit in den Mittelpunkt des allgeneinen Interesses gerückt und übt so eine gröbere Wirkung auf breitere Kreis aus, als sie es noch vor 20, ja vor 10 Jahen vermochte. Eine neue Form des bewegten Ausdrucks will sich bilden.
Perhaps in no field of artistic development, the last years have brought about such a development as in the field of dance art. It is, as the last part of the work on the human movement, more and more pushed into the centre of general interest, and thus exerts a greater effect on a wider circle than it did 20 or even 10 years ago. A new form of moving expression wants to form itself. (Introduction, V)
Rudolf Jobst (Austrian, 1872-1952) Schwestern Wiesenthal [Wiesenthal sisters] From Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit [The Artistic Dance of Our Time] p. 4 Published 1928
Hugo Erfurth (German, 1874-1948) Schwestern Wiesenthal (Wiesenthal sisters) From Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit (The Artistic Dance of Our Time) p. 5 Published 1928
Hugo Erfurth (German, 1874-1948) Grete Wiesenthal From Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit (The Artistic Dance of Our Time) p. 6 Published 1928
Grete Wiesenthal (Austrian, 1885-1970)
Austrian dancer and choreographer. She and her sister Elsa (1887-1967) were both dancers with the Vienna Court Opera Ballet but she left in 1904 to choreograph and perform her own work, which was accompanied primarily by waltz music (Chopin and J. Strauss). She proved so popular that her sisters Elsa and Berta joined her in works that communicated a (then) revolutionarily ecstatic response to waltz rhythms. The sisters moved to Berlin where they performed together until 1910, after which Grete worked independently, choreographing and performing in vaudeville, film, and opera around Europe and the US. The Grete Wiesenthal Dance group (1945-1956) toured the world and two of its members subsequently staged her dances for the Vienna State Opera Ballet. …
The “ambassador of waltz,” began life as a dancer within the traditions of ballet; entered the corps (1901) and advanced to coryphée (1902); with sister Elsa, began choreographing new ways of movement and expression through dance and allied with Secession circle of innovators; with Elsa and sister Berta, came to prominence as the Wiesenthal sisters at Vienna’s Cabaret Fledermaus (1908); in Berlin, danced with sisters at Max Reinhardt’s Deutsches Theater; danced role of 1st elf in Reinhardt’s production of A Midsummer Night’s Dream at Munich’s Artist’s Theater (1909); with sisters, performed at London’s Hippodrome and at Théâtre du Vaudeville in Paris (1909).
Made solo debut in Berlin in pantomime Sumurùn, produced by Reinhardt (1910); made US debut at Winter Garden in NY (1912); created role of Kitchen Boy in Reinhardt’s Stuttgart production of Der Bürger als Edelmann, with music by Richard Strauss; appeared in “Grete Wiesenthal Series” of films (1913-1914): Kadra Sâfa, Erlkönigs Tochter and Die goldne Fliege; following WWI, opened dancing school (1919); returned to Vienna stage at Staatsoper (State Opera House), in lead role of her ballet Der Taugenichts in Wien (The Ne’er-Do-Well in Vienna, 1927); remained active professionally, appearing in solo dance concerts and tours, including a return to NY (1933); appointed professor of dance at Vienna’s Academy for Music and the Performing Arts (1934), then served as director of artistic dance section (1945-1952).
After WWII, her work enjoyed a renaissance in Austria, especially the dances she created for various Salzburg Festival productions; wrote autobiography, Der Aufstieg (The Way Upwards, 1919), which appeared as Die ersten Schritte (The First Steps, 1947); also published a novel, Iffi: Roman einer Tänzerin (Iffi: Novel of a Dancer, 1951); best remembered for having transformed the Viennese waltz from a monotonous one-two-three movement, performed by smiling dancers laced into corsets, into an ecstatic experience, performed by dancers with unbound hair and swinging dresses.
Text from the Gustav Mahler website Nd [Online] Cited 13/12/2017. No longer available online
Rudolf Jobst (Austrian, 1872-1952) Else Wiesenthal From Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit (The Artistic Dance of Our Time) p. 7 Published 1928
Hanns Holdt (German, 1887-1944) Sent M’Ahesa From Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit (The Artistic Dance of Our Time) p. 10 Published 1928
Franz Löwy (Austrian, 1883-1949) Sent M’Ahesa From Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit (The Artistic Dance of Our Time) p. 11 Published 1928
Sent M’Ahesa (born August 17, 1883 in Riga as Else von Carlberg – November 19, 1970 in Stockholm ) was a expressive dancer, who worked in Germany until the 1920s. She also wrote articles for newspapers and magazines.
She was portrayed by Max Beckmann, Bernhard Hoetger, Dietz Edzard and Adolf Münzer. The Greek writer Nikos Kazantzakis saw her dance in Berlin in 1923 (“She danced only once and then returned to her Munich villa”) and wrote to his wife: “Since I saw Sent M’Ahesa dancing I do not want any other kind of dance, I saw its highest form.”
Text from the Wikipedia website
Hugo Erfurth (German, 1874-1948) Sent M’Ahesa From Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit (The Artistic Dance of Our Time) p. 12 Published 1928
d’Ora (Arthur Benda) (Vienna) Sent M’Ahesa From Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit (The Artistic Dance of Our Time) p. 13 Published 1928
Hugo Erfurth (German, 1874-1948) Sent M’Ahesa From Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit (The Artistic Dance of Our Time) p. 14 Published 1928
Hanns Holdt (Munich) Sent M’Ahesa From Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit (The Artistic Dance of Our Time) p. 15 Published 1928
Hanns Holdt (German, 1887-1944) Sent M’Ahesa From Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit (The Artistic Dance of Our Time) p. 16 Published 1928
Franz Löwy (Austrian, 1883-1949) Sent M’Ahesa From Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit (The Artistic Dance of Our Time) p. 17 Published 1928
Sent M’Ahesa (Elsa von Carlberg, German 1883-1970)
“Such confusion of identity did not apply in the case of Sent M’Ahesa (Elsa von Carlberg 1883-1970), whom audiences persisted in identifying with Egyptian dances (though her dance aesthetic included images from other ancient o exotic cultures). She performed all her dances solo. Born in Latvia, she went to Berlin in 1907 with her sister to study Egyptology but became so enchanted with ancient Egyptian art and artifacts that she decided to pursue her interest through dance rather than scholarship… Under he name of Sent M’Ahesa, she presented a program of Egyptian dances in Munich in December 1909 (Ettlinger). From then until the mid-1920s, she achieved fame for her exceptionally dramatic dances dominated by motifs from ancient Egyptian iconography. …
Her dances always functioned in relation to intricate, highly decorative costumes of her own design, so that it appeared as if she chose movements for their effect upon her costume. In her moon goddess (or Isis) dance, she attached large, diaphanous cloth wings to her black-sleeved arms… Sent M’Ahesa often exposed her flesh below the navel, but I have yet to find a picture of her in which she exposed her hair, so keen was she on the use of wigs, helmets, caps, scarves, kerchiefs, tiaras, masks, and crowns. In her peacock dance, she attached a large fan of white feather plumes to her spine. In other dances, she draped herself with tassels, decorative aprons, double sashes, layers of jeweled necklaces, and arm, wrist, and ankle bracelets. Only in her Indian dances did she wear anything resembling pants. …
… her body was wonderfully svelte, and her face displayed a cool, chiseled beauty, I think, rather, that she sought to decontextualise female beauty and erotic feeling from archetypal images of them originating in cultures other than her own or her audience’s; she sought to dramatse a tension between a modern female body and old images of female desire and desirability. Ettlinger, in 1910, was perhaps more accurate when he remarked that
“Sent M’Ahesa’s dance has nothing to do with what one commonly understands as dance. She does not produce “beautiful,” “sensually titillating” effects. She does not represent feelings, “fear,” “horror,” “lust,” “despair,” as “lovely.” Her are requires its own style. Her movements are angular, geometrically uncircular, just as we find them in old Egyptian paintings and reliefs. Neither softness of line nor playful grace are the weapons with which she puts us under her spell. On the contrary: her body constructs hard, quite unnaturally broken lines. Arms and legs take on nearly doll-like attitudes. But precisely this deliberate limiting of gestures gives her the possibility of until now unknown, utterly minute intensities, the most exquisite of refinements of bodily expression. With a sinking of the arm of only a few millimeters, she calls forth effects which all the tricks of the ballet school cannot teach.”
…
Sent M’Ahesa was similar to Schrenck in one respect, even though Schrenck never performed exotic dances: both project and intensely erotic aura while moving within a very confined space. They showed persuasively that convincing signification of erotic desire or pleasure did not depend on a feeling of freedom in space, as exemplified in the convention of ballet and modern dance, with their cliched use of runs, leaps, pirouettes, and aerial acrobatics. These dancers revealed that erotic aura intensifies in relation to an acute sense of bodily confinement, of the body imploding, turning in on itself, riddled with tensions and contradictory pressures. They adopted movements to portray the body being squeezed and twisted, drifting in to a repertoire of squirms, spasms, angular thrusts, muscular suspensions. Contortionist dancing is perhaps the most extreme expression of this aesthetic. But Sent M’Ahesa complicated the matter by doing exotic dances – that is, she confined her body within a remote cultural-historical context, as if to suggest that the ecstatic body imploded metaphorical as well as physical space.”
Karl Eric Toepfer, “Solo Dancing,” in Karl Eric Toepfer. Empire of Ecstasy: Nudity and Movement in German Body Culture, 1910-1935. University of California Press, 1997, pp. 175-179.
Hanns Holdt (German, 1887-1944) Sent M’Ahesa From Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit (The Artistic Dance of Our Time) p. 18 Published 1928
Minya Diez-Dührkoop (German, 1873-1929) Clotilde von Derp-Sacharoff From Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit (The Artistic Dance of Our Time) p. 19 Published 1928
Hugo Erfurth (German, 1874-1948) Clotilde von Derp-Sacharoff From Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit (The Artistic Dance of Our Time) p. 20 Published 1928
Hugo Erfurth (German, 1874-1948) Clotilde von Derp-Sacharoff From Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit (The Artistic Dance of Our Time) p. 21 Published 1928
Hugo Erfurth (German, 1874-1948) Clotilde von Derp-Sacharoff From Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit (The Artistic Dance of Our Time) p. 23 Published 1928
Clotilde von Derp-Sacharoff (German, 1892-1974)
Clotilde von Derp, stage name of Clotilde Margarete Anna Edle von der Planitz (5 November 1892 – 11 January 1974), was a German expressionist dancer, an early exponent of modern dance. Her career was spent essentially dancing together with her husband Alexander Sakharoff with whom she enjoyed a long-lasting relationship. …
As a child in Munich, Clotilde dreamt of becoming a violinist but from an early age she revealed how talented she was as a dancer. After receiving ballet lessons from Julie Bergmann and Anna Ornelli from the Munich Opera, she gave her first performance on 25 April 1910 at the Hotel Union, using the stage name Clotilde von Derp. The audience were enthralled by her striking beauty and youthful grace. Max Reinhardt presented her in the title role in his pantomime Sumurûn which proved a great success while on tour in London. A photo by Rudolf Dührkoop of her was exhibited in 1913 at the Royal Photographic Society. Clotilde was a member of the radical Blaue Reiter Circle which had been started by Wassily Kandinsky in 1911.
Among her admirers were artists such as Rainer Maria Rilke and Yvan Goll. For his Swiss dance presentations, Alexej von Jawlensky gave her make-up resembling his abstract portraits. From 1913, Clotilde appeared with the Russian dancer Alexander Sacharoff with whom she moved to Switzerland during the First World War. Both Sacharoff and Clotilde were known for their transvestite costumes. Clotilde’s femininity was said to be accentuated by the male attire. Her costumes took on an ancient Greek look which she used in Danseuse de Delphes in 1916. Her style was said to be elegant and more modern than that achieved by Isadora Duncan. Their outrageous costumes included wigs made from silver and gold coloured metal, with hats and outfits decorated with flowers and wax fruit.
They married in 1919 and, with the financial support of Edith Rockefeller, appeared at the Metropolitan Opera in New York but without any great success. They lived in Paris until the Second World War. Using the name “Les Sakharoff.” Their 1921 poster by George Barbier to advertise their work was seen as showing a “mutually complementary androgynous couple” “united in dance” joined together in an act of “artistic creation.”
They toured widely visiting China and Japan which was so successful that they returned again in 1934. They and their extravagant costumes visited both North and South America. They found themselves in Spain when France was invaded by Germany. They returned to South America making a new base in Buenos Aires until 1949. They toured Italy the following year and they took up an invitation to teach in Rome by Guido Chigi Saracini. They taught at the Accademia Musicale Chigiana in Siena for Saracini and they also opened their own dance school in Rome. She and Sakharoff stopped dancing together in 1956. They both continued to live in Rome until their deaths. Clotilde gave and sold many of their writings and costumes, that still remained, to museums and auctions. She eventually sold the iconic 1909 painting of her husband by Alexander Jawlensky. In 1997 the German Dance Archive Cologne purchased many remaining items and they have 65 costumes, hundreds of set and costume designs and 500 photographs.
Unlike her husband, Clotilde had a taste for modern music, frequently choosing melancholic music by contemporaries such as Max Reger, Florent Schmitt and Stravinsky. Her haunting eyes and delicate smiles gave the impression she took pleasure in displaying her finely-costumed voluptuous body, even when she reached her forties. She was particularly effective in interpreting Debussy’s Prélude à l’après-midi d’un faune. Hans Brandenbourg maintained her ballet technique was superior to that of Alexander although he did not consider her a virtuoso. Clotilde also moved more independently of the music, dancing to the impression it created in her mind rather than to the rhythm.
Hugo Erfurth (German, 1874-1948) Clotilde von Derp-Sacharoff From Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit (The Artistic Dance of Our Time) p. 26 Published 1928
Atelier Veritas (Munich) (Stephanie Held-Ludwig) (German born Schaulen, Russia now Lithuania, 1871-1943) Clotilde von Derp-Sacharoff From Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit (The Artistic Dance of Our Time) p. 27 Published 1928
The studio name “Veritas,” Latin for “truth,” was programmatic. Stephanie Held-Ludwig’s portraits were not about impressive poses, but about capturing the true, lifelike essence of a person. Art critics praised the quality of her photographs. In 1908, Fritz von Ostini commented on Stephanie Ludwig’s photos: “The pictures are beautifully toned and possess an artistic spontaneity and fidelity to life that fully justifies the proud name of the studio – ‘Veritas’.” In 1911, the Munich Neueste Nachrichten reported: “The most striking feature of these portrait photographs is their wonderful rendering of the psychological and characteristic aspects; a number of the pictures are absolutely striking.” In the same year, Stephanie Ludwig also photographed a series for Westermann’s monthly magazine featuring dolls by Käthe Kruse, which, based on designs by the artist Max Kruse, had only been released the previous year. In 1912, the Allgemeine Zeitung reported that Held-Ludwig’s photographs were “simple portraits, but so subtle in their understanding of character and so lovingly executed that they appear as works of art in and of themselves.”
Unlike Atelier Elvira, Atelier Veritas and its owner were almost forgotten for a long time. Ulrich Pohlmann, head of the photography collection at the Munich City Museum, wrote of Stephanie Held-Ludwig that she was one of those few “emancipated women whose creativity could rival that of their established male colleagues.” …
Much biographical information about Stephanie Held-Ludwig is still missing. It is known that the Atelier Veritas moved to Leopoldstraße 44 in 1914. The photographer herself lived there from 1923 onwards. She also rented out rooms; Edgar Weil was her subtenant from 1928 to 1929. From 1932 to 1936, Held-Ludwig lived in Starnberg, followed by further moves to Josefstraße 40 in Aubing, Giselastraße 12/III, Ohmstraße 7, and Dachauer Straße 46/III. This frequent change of residence was likely related to the professional restrictions imposed on her as a Jew under the Nazi dictatorship, until she was finally forced to withdraw completely from public life.
On July 22, 1942, she was deported to the Theresienstadt concentration camp. She died there on January 16, 1943, from a “Theresienstadt disease”, which could refer to bacterial dysentery, typhus or pneumonia.
Nijinski Aus dem werke “Das Russische Theater”, Amalthea-Verlag, Wien (From the works “The Russian Theater”, Amalthea-Verlag, Vienna) From Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit (The Artistic Dance of Our Time) p. 28 Published 1928
Nijinski Porträt karten verlag Leiser, Berlin – Wilmersdorf Portrait cards Verlag Leiser, Berlin – Wilmersdorf From Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit (The Artistic Dance of Our Time) p. 29 Published 1928
E. O. Hoppé (British, 1878-1972) Nijinski From Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit (The Artistic Dance of Our Time) p. 30 Published 1928
Nijinski Aus dem werke “Das Russische Theater”, Amalthea-Verlag, Wien (From the works “The Russian Theater”, Amalthea-Verlag, Vienna) From Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit (The Artistic Dance of Our Time) p. 31 Published 1928
Nijinski Porträt karten verlag Leiser, Berlin – Wilmersdorf Portrait cards Verlag Leiser, Berlin – Wilmersdorf From Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit (The Artistic Dance of Our Time) p. 32 Published 1928
Nijinski Aus dem werke “Das Russische Theater”, Amalthea-Verlag, Wien (From the works “The Russian Theater”, Amalthea-Verlag, Vienna) From Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit (The Artistic Dance of Our Time) p. 33 Published 1928
Nijinski Aus dem werke “Das Russische Theater”, Amalthea-Verlag, Wien (From the works “The Russian Theater”, Amalthea-Verlag, Vienna) From Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit (The Artistic Dance of Our Time) p. 35 Published 1928
d’Ora (Arthur Benda) (Vienna) Anna Pavlova From Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit (The Artistic Dance of Our Time) p. 36 Published 1928
Hänse Herrmann (German, 1864-1932) Anna Pavlova From Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit (The Artistic Dance of Our Time) p. 37 Published 1928
Hänse Herrmann (German, 1864-1932) Anna Pavlova From Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit (The Artistic Dance of Our Time) p. 38 Published 1928
Hänse Herrmann (German, 1864-1932) Anna Pavlova From Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit (The Artistic Dance of Our Time) p. 39 Published 1928
Hänse Herrmann (German, 1864-1932) Anna Pavlova From Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit (The Artistic Dance of Our Time) p. 40 Published 1928
Hänse Herrmann (German, 1864-1932) Anna Pavlova From Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit (The Artistic Dance of Our Time) p. 41 Published 1928
Hänse Herrmann (German, 1864-1932) Anna Pavolva From Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit (The Artistic Dance of Our Time) p. 42 Published 1928
Hänse Herrmann (German, 1864-1932) Anna Pavlova From Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit (The Artistic Dance of Our Time) p. 43 Published 1928
Ernst Schneider (German, 1881-1959) Anna Pavlova From Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit (The Artistic Dance of Our Time) p. 44 Published 1928
E. O. Hoppé (British, 1878-1972) Anna Pavlova From Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit (The Artistic Dance of Our Time) p. 45 Published 1928
Scheidegger & Spiess (publisher) Walter Mittelholzer Revisited from the photo archive of Walter Mittelholzer (front cover) Edited by Michael Gasser and Nicole Graf 1st edition, 2017 Pictorial Worlds: Photographs from the image Archive, ETH-Bibliothek Volume 6 Text English and German Hardback 192 pages, 47 colour and 158 b/w illustrations 20 x 26cm ISBN 978-3-85881-543-9
Do you have a new book fetish? I know I do!
I just love the feel of a brand new, unopened book. The density and quality of the boards, the dynamics of the graphics on the cover… and then, opening the book for the first time, the thickness of the paper, the typography and layout, and the quality of the photographic printing. But above all, it is the smell of a new book that is so intoxicating. I like nothing better than to stick my nose into a new book and savor the smell.
Every new book is different. Each has their own unique aroma, which is caused by a number of chemical reactions used when they are manufactured. “The smell of new books can be attributed to three factors: the paper itself (it smells good because of the chemicals used to manufacture it), the ink used to print the book, and the adhesives used in the process of book-binding.” Which brings me to the book under review today, Walter Mittelholzer Revisited from the photo archive of Walter Mittelholzer, published by Scheidegger & Spiess (2017).
This just under A4 sized hardback book is handsomely produced by Scheidegger & Spiess, No. 6 in the Pictorial Worlds: Photographs from the image Archive, ETH-Bibliothek series. It feels good and solid in the hand. The 23cm thick book has a plain white cover with minimal text. Inset into an embossed area of the cover is a photographic print of Mittelholzer’s Flugplatz in Addis Abeba [Airfield in Addis Ababa] c. 1934. This is an elegant opening statement (see above).
Thick boards lead to plain, light grey endpapers, and on to the pages of the book themselves: excellent quality paper with a slightly textured surface with eminently readable typography. The Editors Foreword and Introduction (with bibliography), printed in both German and English, takes up the first 47 pages of the 192 page book. Images on these pages are rather small and are inset into the text with titles underneath; footnotes are at the bottom of each page.
As for the images themselves, the are well printed within the body of the book, mainly four horizontal images per page with vertical images one to a page. Colour saturation and reproduction is excellent with the images moving from cool, blue tones to warmer yellows and browns. Contrary to what the name suggests, black and white photography is never truly black and white and there are many variations of colour in black and white prints including split toning (a mixture of cool and warm tones together). The printing in this book perfectly captures the colour tonality of the original photographs. Large photographs are printed across the gutter of the book. In the main this works reasonably well, but on occasion (such as the photograph on p. 110 of an African sitting on the ground in camp), the gutter runs right through the subjects’ body, rending the image almost unreadable. In this instance, a fold out of the photograph with the fold repositioned to avoid the figure would have been a desirable outcome.
In terms of the work itself, one cannot underestimate the determination and courage that Mittelholzer possessed in undertaking dangerous journeys through various continents early in the 20th century to document the life of people and place. The reliability of the aircraft, and the hostility of some of the population were constant threats: you only have to look at the photograph Captain Wood and Wegmann still found a cozy spot in the cabin filled with gasoline and oil barrels (1930-31, below) to understand the inherent dangers of flying in those days, surrounded by gasoline and oil barrels. While it could be said that these photographs are just “tourist” photos and Mittelholzer a keen media entrepreneur, marketing “the pictures of his travels to Spitsbergen, Persia or Abyssinia on all channels: in books, films and in the press” – they rise above the purely commercial in their use of aerial photography to transcend and abstract the landscape into pattern and form. The “airplane eye,” a symbiosis of man and machine, was a way of collapsing space… “The verticals that had hitherto defined the artistic gaze had suddenly become obsolete. The tilting of viewer space and oblique perspectives from both above and below were elevated to a new program for both architecture and art.” (p. 35)
Less savoury is Mittelholzer’s patronising view of Africa and its peoples and cultures, even as he and his fellow travellers constantly searched for the most “natural”, the most “authentic” Africa (in their eyes). From a contemporary perspective, these photographs must always be looked at through the prism of colonialism, for this is a white, European male view of these continents and their people. Today, the colonial stereotypes implicit in the photographs are as strong as ever: black / white, male / female, empowered / disempowered seen through the male gaze. More troubling still, and something the Introduction does not shy away from, is Mittelholzer’s connections to the National Socialist party in Germany, the Nazis.
“His images also won approval of the Fascists. His contribution to the German anthology Flug und Wolken published after the Nazis seized power in fact comprised not just photographs but also one of the three prefaces, the other two being the work of Herman Göring, the “Third Reich’s” commander-in chief of the Luftwaffe, and Italo Balbo, Fascist Italy’s aviation minister. Göring for his part lavished praised on the “high artistic appeal” of a book showing the beauty of the “conquered world of the clouds.” (p. 35) You could also add, the conquered lands of the people – for Germany, Britain, Italy and France all had colonies in Africa. His flights in 1924 to Spitsbergen to assist Polar explorer Roald Amundsen and a year later to deliver a plane to Persia were both undertaken for the German aircraft manufacturer Junkers.
Reading between the lines, Mittelholzer seems to have been untroubled by his relationship with the Nazis, perhaps even sympathetic to their cause? His celebrity status allowed him access to elite circles, people such as Baron Louis von Rothschild, socialites, bankers and publishers to fund his expeditions. This state of affairs reminds me of that celebrated German photographer, Leni Riefenstahl – climbing on the back of ambition and closeness to power, whilst denying that she did anything wrong or knew of the despicable acts that were being perpetrated under the National Socialist regime. In the end it’s all about ambition and ego and what you are willing to sacrifice to achieve your goals. Bear that in mind when you are looking at these images.
Dr Marcus Bunyan
Many thankx to Scheidegger & Spiess for the review copy of the book, and for allowing me to publish the photographs in the posting. Please click on the photographs for a larger version of the image.
Pictures from Cape Town to Spitsbergen: How aviation pioneer and photographer Walter Mittelholzer became a media entrepreneur.
Walter Mittelholzer (Swiss, 1894-1937) Castell in Aleppo 1925 Persia flight 1924-1925 Silver gelatin photograph 12 x 17 cm
Entrance to the citadel of Aleppo, 1925. The citadel is one of the oldest fortresses in the world; its origins can be traced back to the 3rd millennium B.C. The ongoing Syrian Civil War has left it badly damaged.
The Citadel of Aleppo is a large medieval fortified palace in the centre of the old city of Aleppo, northern Syria. It is considered to be one of the oldest and largest castles in the world. Usage of the Citadel hill dates back at least to the middle of the 3rd millennium BC. Subsequently occupied by many civilizations including the Greeks, Byzantines, Ayyubids and Mamluks, the majority of the construction as it stands today is thought to originate from the Ayyubid period. An extensive conservation work took place in the 2000s by the Aga Khan Trust for Culture in collaboration with Aleppo Archeological Society. Dominating the city, the Citadel is part of the Ancient City of Aleppo, a UNESCO World Heritage Site since 1986. The Citadel has received significant damage in the ongoing Syrian Civil War.
Walter Mittelholzer (2 April 1894 – 9 May 1937) was a Swiss aviation pioneer. He was active as a pilot, photographer, travel writer, as well as of the first aviation entrepreneurs. Mittelholzer was born on 2 April 1894 in St. Gallen, the son of a baker, earned his private pilot’s license in 1917. In 1918 he completed his instruction as a military pilot.
On 5 November 1919 he co-founded an air-photo and passenger flight business, Comte, Mittelholzer, and Co. In 1920 this firm merged with the financially stronger Ad Astra Aero. Mittelholzer was the director and head pilot of Ad Astra Aero, which later became Swissair.
He made the first north-south flight across Africa. It took him 77 days. Mittelholzer started in Zürich on 7 December 1926, flying via Alexandria and landing in Cape Town on 21 February 1927. Earlier, he had been the first to do serious aerial reconnaissance of Spitsbergen, in a Junkers monoplane, in 1923. On 08 January 1930 he became the first person to fly over Mount Kilimanjaro; he planned to fly over Mount Everest later in 1930. In 1931, Mittelholzer was appointed technical director of the new airline called Swissair, formed from the merger of Ad Astra Aero and Balair. Throughout his life he published many books of aerial photographs and marketed his expeditions through films and the media as well. He died in 1937 in a climbing accident on an expedition in the Hochschwab massif in southwest face of Stangenwand in Styria, Austria.
Walter Mittelholzer (Swiss, 1894-1937) Buschehr aus 800 m Höhe 1925 Persia flight 1924-1925 Silver gelatin photograph 12 x 17cm
The peninsula with Bushehr on the Persian Gulf, 1925
Walter Mittelholzer (Swiss, 1894-1937) Flugplatz Isfahan mit A 20 am Boden [Airfield Isfahan with A 20 on the ground] 1925 Persia flight 1924-1925 Silver gelatin photograph 12 x 17cm
Isfahan, historically also rendered in English as Ispahan, Sepahan, Esfahan or Hispahan, is the capital of Isfahan Province in Iran, located about 340 kilometres (211 miles) south of Tehran.
Walter Mittelholzer (Swiss, 1894-1937) Wilde Schlussszene des Opfertanzes [Wild final scene of the sacrificial dance] 1926-1927 Silver gelatin photograph
Walter Mittelholzer (Swiss, 1894-1937) Die Expeditionsteilnehmer: René Gouzy, Arnold Heim, Walter Mittelholzer, Hans Hartmann 1926-1927 Silver gelatin photograph
Walter Mittelholzer (Swiss, 1894-1937) Dornier Merkur, CH-171 “Switzerland” der Ad Astra Aero AG auf dem Zürichsee vor dem Afrikaflug [Dornier Merkur, CH-171 “Switzerland” of Ad Astra Aero AG on Lake Zurich before the Africa flight] c. 1926 Silver gelatin photograph 13 x 18cm
Walter Mittelholzer (Swiss, 1894-1937) Westabsturz des Mokattamgebirge mit Niltal [Western Plateau of the Mokattam Mountains with Nile Valley] 1929 Silver gelatin photograph 9 x 12cm
The plateau of Mokattam near Cairo, 1930. The balloonist Eduard Spelterini also photographed this landscape from the air during his 1904 expedition to Egypt.
Walter Mittelholzer (Swiss, 1894-1937) Fremdenverkehr vor der Sphinx [Tourism in front of the Sphinx] 1929 Silver gelatin photograph 9 x 12cm
The Pyramids of Giza with the Sphinx and tourists, 1930. The archaeological excavations there began with Napoleon’s Egyptian campaign of 1798.
Walter Mittelholzer (Swiss, 1894-1937) Totentempel Ramses III., Theben [Mortuary temple of Ramses III, Thebes] 1929 Silver gelatin photograph 9 x 12cm
Walter Mittelholzer (1894-1937) was a pioneering aviator and cofounder of Switzerland’s legendary airline Swissair. From his earliest flights, he was also an avid aerial photographer, and his spectacular views of the Swiss Alps have been popular ever since he began publishing them in the 1920s. Mittelholzer also participated in expeditions to more distant locations, supporting his activities by selling photographs and receiving donations from patrons. Today, the Mittelholzer archive is part of the vast image archive at ETH Bibliothek, the main library at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (ETH Zurich).
The sixth volume in Scheidegger & Spiess’s Pictorial Worlds series, Walter Mittelholzer Revisited reproduces two hundred of the most striking and historically significant photographs from the archive. Together, the photographs document Mittelholzer’s extensive travels, including trips to what is today Iran, Ethiopia, and the Svalbard Islands of northern Norway, as well as his 1926-7 trip to Africa on the seaplane Switzerland, which made Mittelholzer a household name both in aviation and photography. Rounding out the book is an essay that revisits Mittelholzer’s activities from a contemporary perspective, with a focus on the issue of colonialism and his patronising view of Africa and its peoples and cultures. The book will appeal to anyone interested in the history of photography.
Walter Mittelholzer (1894-1937), aviation pioneer and one of the co-founders of Swissair, is best known as a great aerial photographer. In particular, his photographs of the Swiss Alps are still present today. Less well known are Mittelholzer’s flight expeditions abroad, with which he also proved to be a keen media entrepreneur. He marketed the pictures of his travels to Spitsbergen, Persia or Abyssinia on all channels: in books, films and in the press. The breakthrough came Mittelholzer with the Africa flight 1926/27 in the seaplane Switzerland from Zurich to Cape Town. Mittelholzer’s flights were financially supported by important industrialists and bankers of the time and had the declared intention of making aviation popular in Switzerland.
The new volume of the series Bilderwelten sheds light on 200 media images and an essay on Mittelholzer’s media presence, inquires into the African image of the aviation and photo pioneer and tells how Swissair stood out against a largely colonialistic backdrop.
Pictorial Worlds: Photographs from the Image archive, ETH-Bibliothek, Vol. 6
Edited by Michael Gasser and Nicole Graf 1st edition, 2017 Text English and German Hardback 192 pages, 47 colour and 158 b/w illustrations 20 x 26 cm ISBN 978-3-85881-543-9
Imagery. Photographs from the image archive of the ETH-Bibliothek. Volume 6
Text from the Scheidegger & Spiess website
Walter Mittelholzer (Swiss, 1894-1937) Krater des Kibo Teil des Kilimanjaro-Massivs [Part of the Kilimanjaro massif] 1930 Silver gelatin photograph 13 x 18cm
On his Kilimanjaro flight Mittelholzer flew over both Mount Kibo (this image) and Mount Kenya, one of Africa’s highest peaks, 1930.
Mount Kilimanjaro with its three volcanic cones, “Kibo”, “Mawenzi”, and “Shira”, is a dormant volcano in Tanzania. It is the highest mountain in Africa, and rises approximately 4,900 metres (16,100 ft) from its base to 5,895 metres (19,341 ft) above sea level. The first persons known to have reached the summit of the mountain were Hans Meyer and Ludwig Purtscheller in 1889. The mountain is part of the Kilimanjaro National Park and is a major climbing destination. The mountain has been the subject of many scientific studies because of its shrinking glaciers and disappearing ice fields.
Text from the Wikipedia website
Walter Mittelholzer (Swiss, 1894-1937) Tanken in Mongalla [Refuelling in Mongalla] 1930 Silver gelatin photograph 9 x 12cm
Refuelling stop at Mongalla, Sudan, 1930. Oil and gasoline were supplied to the various way stations by the Anglo-Dutch company Shell.
Mongalla or Mangalla is a community in Jubek State in South Sudan, on the east side of the Bahr al Jebel or White Nile river. It lies about 75 km by road northeast of Juba. The towns of Terekeka and Bor lie downstream, north of Mongalla.
During the colonial era, Mongalla was capital of Mongalla Province, which reached south to Uganda and east towards Ethiopia. On 7 December 1917 the last of the northern Sudanese troops were withdrawn from Mongalla, replaced by Equatorial troops. These southern and at least nominally Christian troops remained the only permanent garrison of the town and province until their mutiny in August 1955. Mongalla and the surrounding province was then absorbed into Equatoria Province in 1956. The town was taken and retaken more than once during the Second Sudanese Civil War (1983-2005).
Text from the Wikipedia website
Walter Mittelholzer (Swiss, 1894-1937) Massaifrauen mit Kupferringen als Schmuck [Massai women with copper rings as jewellery] 1930 Silver gelatin photograph 9 x 12cm
The Maasai are a Nilotic ethnic group inhabiting southern Kenya and northern Tanzania. They are among the best known local populations due to their residence near the many game parks of the African Great Lakes, and their distinctive customs and dress. The Maasai speak the Maa language (ɔl Maa), a member of the Nilo-Saharan family that is related to Dinka and Nuer. They are also educated in the official languages of Kenya and Tanzania, Swahiliand English. The Maasai population has been reported as numbering 841,622 in Kenya in the 2009 census…
Text from the Wikipedia website
Walter Mittelholzer (Swiss, 1894-1937) In der mit Benzin- und Ölfässern gefüllten Kabine haben Captain Wood and Wegmann doch noch ein gemütliches Plätzchen gefunden [Captain Wood and Wegmann still found a cozy spot in the cabin filled with gasoline and oil barrels] 1930-1931 Silver gelatin photograph 9 x 12cm
Mittelholzer always flew with a copilot so that he could take photographs while in the air. Here, he himself is at the controls. Seated in the cabin alongside the oil drums are the mechanic Werner Wegmann and the expedition organiser Georg Wood, 1930/31.
Walter Mittelholzer (Swiss, 1894-1937) Marrakech aus 200 m Höhe 1930-1931 Silver gelatin photograph 9 x 12cm
Like many Moroccan cities, Marrakesh comprises an old fortified city packed with vendors and their stalls (the medina), bordered by modern neighbourhoods, the most prominent of which is Gueliz. Today it is one of the busiest cities in Africa and serves as a major economic centre and tourist destination. Tourism is strongly advocated by the reigning Moroccan monarch, Mohammed VI, with the goal of doubling the number of tourists visiting Morocco to 20 million by 2020. Despite the economic recession, real estate and hotel development in Marrakesh has grown dramatically in the 21st century. Marrakesh is particularly popular with the French, and numerous French celebrities own property in the city. Marrakesh has the largest traditional market (souk) in Morocco, with some 18 souks selling wares ranging from traditional Berber carpets to modern consumer electronics. Crafts employ a significant percentage of the population, who primarily sell their products to tourists.
Text from the Wikipedia website
Walter Mittelholzer (Swiss, 1894-1937) Kano 1930-1931 Silver gelatin photograph 9 x 12cm
Kano is the state capital of Kano State in North West, Nigeria. It is situated in the Sahelian geographic region, south of the Sahara. Kano is the commercial nerve centre of Northern Nigeria and is the second largest city in Nigeria, after Lagos. The Kano metropolis initially covered 137 square kilometres (53 square miles), and comprised six local government areas (LGAs) … The total area of Metropolitan Kano is now 499 square kilometres (193 square miles), with a population of 2,828,861 as of the 2006 Nigerian census. The principal inhabitants of the city are the Hausa people. As in most parts of northern Nigeria, the Hausa language is widely spoken in Kano. The city is the capital of the Kano Emirate.
Text from the Wikipedia website
Walter Mittelholzer (Swiss, 1894-1937) Typen aus dem Atlas: der rastlose Händler [Types from the Atlas: the restless dealer] 1930-1931 Silver gelatin photograph 9 x 12cm
Berbers at a cattle market in the High Atlas, 1930/31
Walter Mittelholzer (Swiss, 1894-1937) Felsgrab Khazne al-Firaun, Petra [Rock Tomb Khazne al-Firaun, Petra] 1934 Silver gelatin photograph 6 x 6cm
Four-day visit to the ancient, rock-hewn city of Petra, 1934. Petra was rediscovered for the Europeans by the Basel adventurer Jean Louis Burckhardt in 1812. Mittelholzer often followed the routes taken by earlier explorers of Asia and Africa and saw his own “expeditions” as continuing their tradition.
Walter Mittelholzer (Swiss, 1894-1937) Kaiser Haile Selassie, Addis Abeba c. 1934 Silver gelatin photograph 6 x 6 cm
Haile Selassie I (23 July 1892 – 27 August 1975), born Tafari Makonnen Woldemikael, was Ethiopia’s regent from 1916 to 1930 and emperor from 1930 to 1974. He also served as Chairperson of the Organisation of African Unity from 25 May 1963 to 17 July 1964 and 5 November 1966 to 11 September 1967. He was a member of the Solomonic Dynasty. …
Among the Rastafari movement, whose followers are estimated at between two and four million, Haile Selassie is revered as the returned messiah of the Bible, God incarnate. Beginning in Jamaica in the 1930s, the Rastafari movement perceives Haile Selassie as a messianic figure who will lead a future golden age of eternal peace, righteousness, and prosperity. Haile Selassie was an Ethiopian Orthodox Christian throughout his life. He is a defining figure in Ethiopian history. Haile Selassie died on 27 August 1975 at the age of 83, following a coup d’état.
Text from the Wikipedia website
Walter Mittelholzer (Swiss, 1894-1937) Itu-Mann vom Südosten Abessiniens [Itu man from southeastern Abyssinia] c. 1934 Silver gelatin photograph 6 x 6cm
Walter Mittelholzer (Swiss, 1894-1937) Dankali-Mädchen [Dankali girl] c. 1934 Silver gelatin photograph 6 x 6cm
Walter Mittelholzer (Swiss, 1894-1937) Flugplatz in Addis Abeba [Airfield in Addis Ababa] c. 1934 Silver gelatin photograph 6 x 6cm
Walter Mittelholzer (Swiss, 1894-1937) Übergabe von Schild und Degen an Walter Mittelholzer [Handover of shield and sword to Walter Mittelholzer] c. 1934 Silver gelatin photograph 6 x 6cm
Walter Mittelholzer (Swiss, 1894-1937) Sudanesischer Kolonialsoldat des englischen Imperiums [Sudanese colonial soldier of the English Empire] c. 1934 Silver gelatin photograph 6 x 6cm
A Christmas present to myself… my most complex and enigmatic sequence to date.
Shot in Japan, all of the images come from two 1950s photography albums, one of which has a large drawing of a USAF bomber on it’s cover. The images were almost lost they were so dirty, scratched and deteriorated. It has taken me four long years to scan, digitally clean and restore the images, heightening the colour already present in the original photographs.
Sometimes the work flowed, sometimes it was like pulling teeth. Many times I nearly gave up, asking myself why I was spending my life cleaning dirt and scratches from these images. The only answer is… that I wanted to use these images so that they told a different story.
Then to sequence the work in such a way that there is an enigmatic quality, a mystery in that narrative journey. Part auteur, part cinema – a poem to the uncertainty of human dreams.
Photographs are available from this series for purchase. As a guide, a digital colour 16″ x 20″ costs $1000 plus tracked and insured shipping. For more information please see my Store web page.
A selection of individual images from the sequence
Exhibition dates: 14th October – 3rd December, 2017
Curator: Richard Perram OAM
Warning: this posting contains male nudity. If you don’t want to see please do not look.
Todd Fuller (Australian, b. 1988) and Amy Hill (Australian, b. 1988) They’re Only Words (video still) 2009 Film, sound duration: 2:42 mins Courtesy the artists and May Space, Sydney
I must congratulate curator and gallery Director, Richard Perram OAM and the Bathurst Regional Art Gallery for putting on such a fine exhibition, worthy of many a large gallery in a capital city. An incredible achievement, coming at the same time as Latrobe Regional Art Gallery put on the recent René Magritte exhibition. All power to these regional galleries. Now on with the show…
Show and tell
The male body. The female body. The trans body. The gay body. Etc. etc. etc. … The male gaze. The female gaze. The trans gaze. The gay gaze. Etc. etc. etc. …
I did my Doctor of Philosophy, all four and a half years of it, on the history of photography and its depiction of the male body so I know this subject intimately. It is such a complicated subject that after all of time, nothing is ever certain, everything is changeable and fluid.
To start, the definition of masculinity that I used as a determination for the term in my PhD is included as the first quotation below. The quotation is followed by others – on the optic experience and the creation of body image; on body image and our relation to other people; on the anxiety caused by the crisis of looking as it intersects with the crisis of the body; and how we can overcome the passivity of objective truth (accepting dominant images in this case, as they are presented to us) through an active struggle for subjective truth, or an acceptance of difference. A further, longer quote in the posting by Chris Schilling examines Ernst Goffman’s theories of body, image and society in which Goffman states that the body is characterised by three main features: firstly, that the body as material property of individuals; secondly, that meanings attributed to the body are determined by ‘shared vocabularies of body idiom’ such as dress, bearing, movements and position, sound level, physical gestures such as waving and saluting, facial decorations, and broad emotional expressions; and thirdly; that the body plays an important role in mediating the relationship between people’s self-identity and their social identity. These quotations just start to scratch the surface of this very complicated, negotiated social area.
What we can say is this: that masculinity is always and forever a construct; that male body image is always and forever a further construct built on the first construct; and that photo media images of the male body are a construct, in fact a double or triple construct as they seek to capture the surface representation of the previous two conditions.
What strikes me with most of the photographs in this posting is that they are about a constructed “performance” of masculinity, performances that challenge cultural signifiers of mainstream and marginalised aspects of Western patriarchal culture. In most the masculine subject position is challenged through complex projections of masculinity, doubled through the construction of images. In fact, spectatorship is no longer male and controlling but polymorphous and not organised along normative gender lines.
Thus, these artists respond to four defined action problems in terms of representation of body usage: “… control (involving the predicability of performance); desire (whether the body is lacking or producing desire); the body’s relation to others (whether the body is monadic and closed in on itself or dyadic and constituted through either communicative or dominating relations with others); and the self-relatedness of the body (whether the body associates and ‘feels at home’ in itself, or dissociates itself from its corporeality).”1 Further, four ideal types of body usage can be defined in terms of these action problems: the disciplined body where the medium is regimentation, the model of which is the rationalisation of the monastic order; the mirroring body where the medium is consumption, the model of which is the department store; the dominating body where the medium is force, the model of which is war; and the communicative body where the medium is recognition, the model of which could be shared narratives, communal rituals (such as sex) and caring relationships.2
As Chris Schilling observes, “The boundaries of the body have shifted away from the natural and on to the social, and the body now has ‘a thoroughly permeable “outer layer” through which the reflexive project of the self and externally formed abstract systems enter.” In other words, masculinity and male figure can be anything to any body and any time in any context. The male body can be prefigured by social conditions. But the paradox is, the more we know masculinity and the male body, the more knowledge we have, the more we can alter and shape these terms, the less certain we are as to what masculinity and the male body is, and how or if it should be controlled. Taking this a step further, Schilling notes that the photographic image of the body itself has become an abstract system/symbolic token which is traded without question, much as money is, without the author or participants being present.3 You only have to look into some of the gay chats rooms to know this to be true!
The most difficult question I had to ask myself in relation to this exhibition was, what is it to be male? Such a question is almost impossible to answer…
Is being male about sex, a penis, homosociality, homosexuality, heterosexuality, friendship, braveness, dominance, perversity, fantasy, love, attraction, desire, pleasure, Ockerism, respect, loyality, spirituality, joy, happiness etc. etc. It is all of these and more besides. And this is where I find some most of these images to be just surface representations of deeper feelings: I just like dressing in drag; I like pulling a gun on someone; I like holding a knife next to my penis to make my phallus and my armoured body look “butch”. It’s as though the “other”, our difference from ourselves (and others), has been normalised and found wanting. I want to strip them away from this performative, normalising aspect. Most of these photographs are male figures dressed up to the nines, projecting an image, a surface, to the outside world (even though the performative tells us a great deal about the peculiarities of the human imagination). I want them to be more essential, not just a large penis dressed up for show. Only in the image Untitled (Auschwitz victim) (Nd, below), where the performance for the camera and the clothing the man is wearing is controlled by others – does some sense of an inner strength of a male come through. In times of unknown horror and dire circumstances, this man stares you straight in the eye with a calm presence and inner composure.
For me personally, being male is about a spiritual connection – to myself, to the earth and to the cosmos. I hope it is about respect for myself and others. Of course I use the systems above as a projection of myself into the world, as to who I am and who I want people to see through my image. But there is so much more to being male than these defined, representational personas. This is not some appeal to, as David Smail puts it, “a simple relativity of ‘truths'” (anything to anybody at anytime in any context), nor a essentialist reductionism to a “single truth” about our sense of being, but an appeal for a ‘non-finality’ of truth, neither fixed nor certain, that changes according to our values and what we understand of ourselves, what it is to be male. This understanding requires intense, ongoing inner work, something many males have no desire to undertake…
Dr Marcus Bunyan
Word count: 1,230
Footnotes
1/ Chris Schilling, The Body and Social Theory, Sage Publications, London, 1993, p.95.
2/ Ibid., p. 95.
3/ Ibid., p. 183.
Many thankx to Director Richard Perram, Assistant Curator Julian Woods and the Bathurst Regional Art Gallery for allowing me to publish the photographs in the posting. Please click on the photographs for a larger version of the image.
“The category of “masculinity” should be seen as always ambivalent, always complicated, always dependent on the exigencies (necessary conditions and requirements) of personal and institutional power … [masculinity is] an interplay of emotional and intellectual factors – an interplay that directly implicates women as well as men, and is mediated by other social factors, including race, sexuality, nationality, and class … Far from being just about men, the idea of masculinity engages, inflects, and shapes everyone.”
Berger, Maurice; Wallis, Brian and Watson, Simon. Constructing Masculinity. Introduction. New York: Routledge, 1995, pp. 3-7.
“We choose and reject by action … Nietzsche calls the body ‘Herrschaftsgebilde’ (creation of the dominating will). We may say the same about body-image. Since optic experience plays such an enormous part in our relation to the world, it will also play a dominating role in the creation of the body-image. But optic experience is also experience by action. By actions and determinations we give the final shape to our bodily self. It is a process of continual active development.” (My underline)
Schilder, Paul. The Image and Appearance of The Human Body. New York: International Universities Press, 1950, pp. 104-105.
“Body images should not exist in isolation. We desire the relation of our body-images to the body-images of all other persons, and we want it especially concerning all sexual activities and their expression in the body-image. Masturbation is specifically social. It is an act by which we attempt to draw the body-images of others, especially in their genital region, nearer to us.”
Schilder, Paul. The Image and Appearance of The Human Body. New York: International Universities Press, 1950, p. 237.
“As the French critic Maurice Blanchot wrote, “The image has nothing to do with signification, meaning, as implied by the existence of the world, the effort of truth, the law and the brightness of the day. Not only is the image of an object not the meaning of that object and of no help in comprehending it, but it tends to withdraw it from its meaning by maintaining it in the immobility of a resemblance that it has nothing to resemble” … It is this severance of meaning and its object, this resemblance of nothing, that the crisis of looking intersects with the crisis of the body. In contemporary culture we promote the body as infinitely extendable and manageable. Indeed, we mediate this concept through the permeation of the photographic image in popular culture – through advertising and dominant discourse that place the young, beautiful, erotic body as the desirable object of social attention. This is a body apparently conditioned by personal control (moral concern). But the splitting apart of image and meaning pointed to by Blanchot suggests that such control is illusory. There is no single truth; there are only competing narratives and interpretations of a world that cannot be wholly, accurately described.” (My underline)
Blanchot, Maurice. The Gaze of Orpheus. New York: Barrytown, 1981, p. 85, quoted in Townsend, Chris. Vile Bodies: Photography and the Crisis of Looking. Munich: Prestel, 1998, p. 10.
“Where objective knowing is passive, subjective knowing is active – rather than giving allegiance to a set of methodological rules which are designed to deliver up truth through some kind of automatic process [in this case the construction of the male figure through the image], the subjective knower takes a personal risk in entering into the meaning of the phenomena to be known … Those who have some time for the validity of subjective experience but intellectual qualms about any kind of ‘truth’ which is not ‘objective’, are apt to solve their problem by appealing to some kind of relativity. For example, it might be felt that we all have our own versions of the truth about which we must tolerantly agree to differ. While in some ways this kind of approach represents an advance on the brute domination of ‘objective truth’, it in fact undercuts and betrays the reality of the world given to our subjectivity. Subjective truth has to be actively struggled for: we need the courage to differ until we can agree. Though the truth is not just a matter of personal perspective, neither is it fixed and certain, objectively ‘out there’ and independent of human knowing. ‘The truth’ changes according to, among other things, developments and alterations in our values and understandings … the ‘non-finality’ of truth is not to be confused with a simple relativity of ‘truths’.” (My underline).
Smail, David. Illusion and Reality: The Meaning of Anxiety. London: J.M. Dent & Sons, 1984, pp. 152-153.
The Unflinching Gaze: photo media & the male figure
The Unflinching Gaze: photo media & the male figure surveys how the male figure has been depicted by Australian and international artists in photo media over the last 140 years. It includes historic and contemporary fine art photography and film, fashion photography, pop videos and homoerotic art. Images range from the beautiful to the banal to the confounding.
The Unflinching Gaze: photo media & the male figure is a Bathurst Regional Art Gallery exhibition in partnership with Leslie-Lohman Museum of Gay and Lesbian Art, New York. Curated by Richard Perram OAM. This exhibition is supported by the Dobell Exhibition Grant, funded by the Sir William Dobell Art Foundation and managed by Museums & Galleries of NSW.
Installation views of the exhibition The Unflinching Gaze: photo media and the male figure at the Bathurst Regional Art Gallery, New South Wales Photos: Sharon Hickey Photography
In line with current thinking the exhibition posits masculinity, and gender itself, as a kind of performance – a social construct that is acquired rather than biologically determined.
This idea has its limits, with most people happy to accept anatomy as destiny. Nevertheless, there is much we view as ‘natural’ that might be more accurately described as ‘cultural’. In an exceptional catalogue essay, Peter McNeil refers to Jonathan Ned Katz’s book, The Invention of Heterosexuality, which notes that the term “heterosexual” was first published in the United States in 1892. This is a remarkably late entry for a concept often viewed as a cornerstone of social orthodoxy.
A condition doesn’t require a word to make it a reality but it sure helps. Wittgenstein’s famous dictum: “The limits of my language are the limits of my world,” reminds us of the power of naming and categorisation.
To establish anything as an unquestionable norm is to stigmatise other views as abnormal. From the perception of abnormality comes the fear and hatred that surfaced during a same-sex marriage postal survey that revealed more about political cowardice than it did about Australian social attitudes. Although Perram has no qualms about celebrating gay sexuality his chief concern is to encourage a broader, more inclusive understanding of masculinity. …
One of the most striking moments in Perram’s show is a juxtaposition of Mapplethorpe’s 1983 portrait of gay porn star, Roger Koch, aka Frank Vickers, wearing a wig, bra and fishnets, his hands clasped demurely over his groin. The feminine coyness is at odds with Vickers’s musclebound torso and biceps which are fully on display in his self-portrait of the same year, along with his semi-erect penis.
The photos may be two versions of camp but the comparison shows how an individual’s sexual identity can be reconfigured with the appropriate props and body language. In the case of performance artist, Leigh Bowery, captured in a series of photos by Fergus Greer, the play of fantasy transcended the simple binary opposition of male and female, to create monstrous hybrids that question the limits of what it is to be human.”
Tony Albert (Australian, b. 1981) Brother (Our Past) 2013 Brother (Our Present) 2013 Brother (Our Future) 2013 Pigment on paper, edition of 3 150 x 100cm each Courtesy UTS Art, Corrigan Collection
Blow Job is a silent film directed by Andy Warhol. It depicts the face of an uncredited DeVeren Bookwalter as he apparently receives fellatio from an unseen partner. While shot at 24 frames per second, Warhol specified that it should be projected at 16 frames per second, slowing it down by a third.
Whether it is a male or a female performing the act is not stated, and the viewer must assume that fellatio is occurring. The salaciousness has also been speculated to be entirely in the title with no fellatio actually being performed. The identity of the person performing the act is disputed. Warhol states in his book Popism: The Warhol Sixties (1980) that five different boys performed the fellatio. In this book, Warhol writes that he originally asked Charles Rydell, the boyfriend of filmmaker Jerome Hill, to star in the film, promising that there would be “five beautiful boys” to perform the act.
However, when Warhol set up the film shoot at The Factory on a Sunday, Rydell failed to show up. Warhol phoned Rydell at Hill’s suite at the Algonquin Hotel and asked where Rydell was. Rydell replied that he thought Warhol was kidding and had no intention of appearing in such a film. When he declined Andy used “a good-looking kid that happened to be hanging around the Factory that day”, who was later identified as Bookwalter. According to Peter Gidal, the film distances the viewer from the experience it purportedly depicts, “Sometimes the young actor looks bored, sometimes as if he is thinking, sometimes as if he is aware of the camera, sometimes as if he is not.” Douglas Crimp states that after a few minutes, “it becomes clear that we will see nothing more than the repetition, with slight variations, of what we’ve already seen”. This frees the mind to look in a different way. Likewise, the sexual act has the effect of distracting the actor from the presence of the camera, creating a unique kind of unselfconsciousness.
Critic Roy Grundmann argues that “Blow Job‘s self-reflexive devices create a new kind of spectatorial address that dislodges audiences from their contemplative positions in a number of ways. Blow Job‘s reflexivity makes spectators intensely aware that seeing a film makes projecting onto and investing into an image a part of oneself which is also a socialized acculturated act”. Grundmann further claims that “viewers oscillate between an awareness of their contingency on the larger scheme and the promise of ocular centric mastery of the image”.
Text from the YouTube website
Robert Wilson (American, b. 1941) Brad Pitt 2004 Video portrait, looped Dimensions variable Courtesy the artist and the Byrd Hoffman Water Mill Foundation, New York
Robert Wilson (American, b. 1941) Brad Pitt video portrait 2004
Nikki Johnson (American, b. 1972) David Amputation Fetishist 2007 Digital print (from a set of images) Courtesy the artist
Luke Parker (Australian, b. 1975) Double hanging 2005 Photograph, cotton thread, pins 15 x 40cm Courtesy the artist and 55 Sydenham Rd
Gregory Collection Mr Cullen & Mr Gornall Date unknown Digital copy from scanned negative Courtesy the Bathurst Historical Society
Two hundred photos and videos by sixty two leading artists (twenty four Australian and thirty eight international) will be exhibited at Bathurst Regional Art Gallery (BRAG) from Saturday 14 October until Sunday 3 December 2017.
Curated by BRAG Director Richard Perram OAM, an openly gay man, The Unflinching Gaze: photo media and the male figure surveys how the male figure has been depicted by Australian and international artists in photo media over the last 140 years. It includes historic and contemporary fine art photography and film, fashion photography, pop videos and homoerotic art. Images range from the beautiful to the banal to the confounding.
Key artists in the exhibition include iconic American artists Robert Mapplethorpe, Andy Warhol, and avant-garde theatre director Robert Wilson with a video portrait of Brad Pitt; European artists such as Eadweard Muybridge, and Baron Wilhelm Von Gloeden; and historic and contemporary Australian artists including Beaufoy Merlin and Charles Bayliss, Max Dupain, Deborah Kelly, William Yang, Gary Carsley, Owen Leong and Liam Benson. Works have been sourced from Australian and international collections, including a major loan of 60 works from the Leslie-Lohman Museum of Gay and Lesbian Art, New York.
The exhibition brings an unflinching gaze to how concepts of humanity and the male figure are intertwined and challenged. Themes include the Pink Triangle, which deals with the persecution, torture and genocide of homosexuals in concentration camps during World War II to those in Chechyna today; and the AIDS crisis in the 1980s.
The Unflinching Gaze exhibition is a unique opportunity for audiences in the Bathurst Region to access a world class photo-media exhibition, says Richard Perram OAM. The Unflinching Gaze not only deals with aesthetic concerns but also engages the community in a discussion around social issues. BRAG is working with local Bathurst LGBTI community groups to ensure that one of the most important outcomes of the exhibition will be to inform and educate the general Bathurst community and support and affirm the Bathurst LGBTI community.
The Unflinching Gaze: photo media and the male figure is a Bathurst Regional Art Gallery exhibition in partnership with Leslie Lohman Museum of Gay and Lesbian Art, New York. Curated by Richard Perram OAM. This exhibition is supported by the Dobell Exhibition Grant, funded by the Sir William Dobell Art Foundation and managed by Museums & Galleries of NSW.
Press release from the Bathurst Regional Art Gallery (BRAG)
American & Australian Photographic Company (Beaufoy Merlin and Charles Bayliss) Mssrs. Bushley & Young Nd Digital reproductions from glass photo negatives, quarter plate From the Collections of the State Library of NSW
Horst P. Horst (Germany; United States, 1906-1996) Male Nude I NY 1952 Silver gelatin print 25.4 x 20.3cm Leslie-Lohman Museum of Gay & Lesbian Art, gift of Ricky Horst
Liam Benson (Australian, b. 1980) The Crusader 2015 The Executioner 2015 The Terrorist 2015 Inkjet print on cotton rag paper, edition of 5 90 x 134cm Photograph by Alex Wisser Courtesy of the artist and Artereal Gallery
George Platt Lynes (American, 1907-1955) Blanchard Kennedy 1936 Gelatin silver photograph 23 x 18.2cm National Gallery of Australia, Canberra. Purchased 1981
Christopher Makos (American, b. 1948) Altered Image: One Photograph of Andy Warhol 1982 Gelatin silver photograph 50.6 x 40.8cm each National Gallery of Australia, Canberra. Purchased 1982
Goffman’s approach to the body is characterised by three main features. First, there is a view of the body as material property of individuals. In contrast to naturalistic views … Goffman argues that individuals usually have the ability to control and monitor their bodily performances in order to facilitate social interaction. Here, the body is associated with the exercise of human agency, and it appears in Goffman’s work as a resource which both requires and enables people to manage their movements and appearances.
Second, while the body is not actually produced by social forces, as in Foucault’s work, the meanings attributed to it are determined by ‘shared vocabularies of body idiom’ which are not under the immediate control of individuals (E. Goffman, Behaviour In Public Places: Notes on the Social Organisation of Gatherings, The Free Press, New York, 1963, p.35). Body idiom is a conventionalized form of non-verbal communication which is by far the most important component of behaviour in public. It is used by Goffman in a general sense to refer to ‘dress, bearing, movements and position, sound level, physical gestures such as waving and saluting, facial decorations, and broad emotional expressions’ (Goffman, 1963:33). As well as allowing us to classify information given off by bodies, shared vocabularies of body idiom provide categories which label and grade hierarchically people according to this information. Consequently, these classifications exert a profound influence over ways in which individuals seek to manage and present their bodies.
The first two features of Goffman’s approach suggest that human bodies have a dual location. Bodies are the property of individuals, yet are defined as significant and meaningful by society. This formulation lies at the core of the third main feature of Goffman’s approach to the body. In Goffman’s work, the body plays an important role in mediating the relationship between people’s self-identity and their social identity. The social meanings which are attached to particular bodily forms and performances tend to become internalized and exert a powerful influence on an individuals sense of self and feelings of inner worth.
Goffman’s general approach to the body is revealed through his more specific analyses of the procedures involved in what he terms the ‘interaction order’. Goffman conceptualises the interaction order as somehow autonomous sphere of social life (others include the economic sphere) which should not be seen as ‘somehow prior, fundamental, or constitutive of the shape of macroscopic phenomena’ (Goffman, 1983:4). His analysis of this sphere of life demonstrates that intervening successfully in daily life, and maintaining a single definition in the face of possible disruptions, requires a high degree of competence in controlling the expressions, movements and communications of the body.” (Goffman, 1969).
Schilling, Chris. The Body and Social Theory. London: Sage Publications, 1993, pp. 82-83.
Owen Leong (Australian, b. 1979) Resistance Training 2017 Archival pigment print on cotton paper, edition of 5 + 2 AP 120 x 120cm Courtesy the artist and Artereal Gallery, Sydney Commissioned by BRAG for The Unflinching Gaze: photo media & the male figure with funds from BRAGS Inc. (Bathurst Regional Art Gallery Society Inc.)
Owen Leong (Australian, b. 1979) Milk Teeth 2014 Archival pigment print on cotton paper, edition of 5 + 2Ap 120 x 120cm Courtesy of the artists and Artereal Gallery Sydney
Samuel J Hood (Australian, 1872-1953) The 9th Field Brigade (four images) 24/2/1938 (Liverpool, NSW) Photo negative (copied from original nitrate photograph) 35mm From the Collections of the State Library of NSW
Anthony Sansone (Italy; United States, 1905-1987) Untitled 1935 Bromide print 24.1 x 18.9cm Leslie-Lohman Museum of Gay & Lesbian Art, gift of David Aden Gallery
Fergus Greer (United Kingdom, 1961-1994) Leigh Bowery, Session V Look 27 February 1992 Digital reproduction Courtesy Fergus Greer
Fergus Greer (United Kingdom, 1961-1994) Leigh Bowery, Session VII Look 34, June 1994 Digital reproduction Courtesy Fergus Greer
Unknown American photographer Vintage photograph from the Closeted History/Wunderkamera Nd Tintypes, paper photographs Collection of Luke Roberts
Frank Vickers (American, 1948-1991) Untitled (self-portrait) 1983 Silver gelatin print 17.8 x 12.4cm Leslie-Lohman Museum of Gay & Lesbian Art, Founders’ gift
Baron Wilhelm von Gloeden (Germany; Italy, 1856-1931) Untitled c. 1910 Albumen silver print 20.3 x 15.2cm Leslie-Lohman Museum of Gay and Lesbian Art, Founders’ gift
Andy Warhol (American, 1928-1987) Untitled (Victor Hugo’s Penis) Date unknown Polaroid 8.5 x 10.5cm Collection of Byrd Hoffman Water Mill Foundation
Gary Carsley (Australian, b. 1957) YOWL [still] 2017 Single Channel HD Video on Layered A3 Photocopy substrate 360 x 247cm Duration 4.32 min Videography Ysia Song, Soundscape Tarun Suresh, Art Direction Shahmen Suku
Royale Hussar (Basil Clavering and John Parkhurst) Queens Guard 3 1959-1960 Digital print from original negative
William Yang (Australian-Chinese, b. 1943) ‘Allan’ from the monologue ‘Sadness’ 1992 19 gelatin silver photographs in the monologue 51.0 x 41.0cm each sheet Photograph: William Yang/Bathurst Regional Art Gallery
A photograph from the Sadness series, which depicts the slow death of his sometime lover, Allan Booth, from AIDS.
This prisoner was sent to Auschwitz under Section 175 of the German Criminal Code, which criminalised homosexuality.
The picture may have been taken by Wilhelm Brasse who was born on this date, 3 December in 1917, who became known as the “photographer of Auschwitz concentration camp”, though he was one of several, including Alfred Woycicki , Tadeusz Myszkowski, Józef Pysz, Józef Światłoch, Eugeniusz Dembek, Bronisław Jureczek, Tadeusz Krzysica, Stanisław Trałka, and Zdzisław Pazio whom the Camp Gestapo kept alive for the job of recording thousands of photographs of their fellow prisoners, supervised by Bernhard Walter, the head of Erkenundienst.
The photographs themselves present a transgression of the subject’s own self-image. The carte-de-visite format forces a confrontation of the victim (which in this situation, they are) with themselves in a visual interrogation, by placing a profile and a three-quarter view either side of a frontal mug shot. The final image seems to depict the subject beholden to a higher authority.
Brasse had been arrested in 1940, at age 23, for trying to leave German-occupied Poland and sent to KL Auschwitz-Birkenau where because he had been a Polish professional photographer in his aunt’s studio his skills were useful. Brasse has estimated that he took 40,000 to 50,000 “identity pictures” from 1940 until 1945.
Brasse and another prisoner Bronisław Jureczek preserved the photographs when in January 1945, during the evacuation of the camp, they were ordered to burn all of the photographs. They put wet photo paper in the furnace first and followed by such a great number of photos and negatives that the fire was suffocated. When the SS-Hauptscharfürer Walter left the laboratory, Brasse and Jureczek swept undestroyed photographs from the furnace, scattering them in the rooms of the laboratory and boarding up the door to the laboratory. 38,916 photographs were saved.
James McCardle. “Ghosts,” on the On This Day in Photography website 03/12/2017
M. P. Rice (American) American poet Walt Whitman and his ‘rebel soldier friend’, Pete Doyle Walt Whitman and Peter Doyle, Washington DC. c. 1865 Charles E. Feinberg Collection, Library of Congress Photograph: Library of Congress/Library of Congress/Bathurst Regional Art Gallery
The first extant photo of Whitman with anyone else, here Peter Doyle, Whitman’s close friend and companion in Washington. Doyle was a horsecar driver and met Whitman one stormy night in 1865 when Whitman, looking (as Doyle said) “like an old sea-captain,” remained the only passenger on Doyle’s car. They were inseparable for the next eight years.
Christopher Makos (American, b. 1982) Altered Image: Five Photographs of Andy Warhol 1982 Portfolio of five gelatin silver prints Each sheet: 20 x 16 in. (50.8 x 40.6cm) Each image: 18 x 12 3/4 in. (45.7 x 32.3cm)
Bathurst Regional Art Gallery (BRAG) 70 -78 Keppel St Bathurst NSW 2795
Opening hours: Tues to Sat 10am – 5pm Sundays 11am – 2pm
James Barnor (Ghanaian based in London, b. 1929) Mike Eghan at the BBC Studios, London (installation view) 1967, printed 2010 Gelatin silver on paper Gift of Eric and Louise Franck London Collection 2013 Photo: Marcus Bunyan
This was the best photography exhibition which wasn’t an exhibition – because it was a “display” – that I saw on my recent trip to Europe.
Why was it the best? Because this is what strong, insightful photography can do: it can capture life; it can document different cultures; and it can be a powerful agent for social change.
I remember London in the 1970s. I lived in Clapham (Claiff-ham Heights) and Stockwell (we called it St. Ockwell) near Brixton at the time. I remember the Brixton riot of 1981, as I was living in my little room down the road, as the cars burnt and the buildings were smashed. “Brixton in South London was an area with serious social and economic problems. The whole United Kingdom was affected by a recession by 1981, but the local African-Caribbean community was suffering particularly high unemployment, poor housing, and a higher than average crime rate.” (Wikipedia) People felt oppressed by recession, racism, the police, and by the establishment, for this was the era of Margaret Thatcher and her bullies. But as these photographs show, there was such a vibrant sense of community in these areas as they sought to ‘stand firm in England’ because it was their home.
It is our great privilege that we have the images of this very talented group of photographers who documented Black communities in London during this time: Raphael Albert, Bandele ‘Tex’ Ajetunmobi, James Barnor, Colin Jones, Neil Kenlock, Dennis Morris, Syd Shelton and Al Vandenberg. And I find it heartening that all of these photographers were documenting their community at the same time. The African-Caribbean diaspora is part of the genetic makeup of the UK and multiculturalism, from where ever it emanates, should be valued in societies around the world. It enriches contemporary culture through an understanding and acceptance of difference.
Against racism; against fascism; against discrimination. For freedom from oppression and the right to be heard.
Dr Marcus Bunyan
PS. There were no media images so I took iPhone installation photographs of the display, so please excuse any reflection of the gallery in the images. I have cleaned and balanced them as much as possible.
James Barnor (Ghanaian based in London, b. 1929) Drum Cover Girl Erlin Ibreck, London (installation view) 1966, printed 2010 C-print on paper Gift of Eric and Louise Franck London Collection 2013 Photo: Marcus Bunyan
“The picture of a young woman leaning against a shiny grey Jaguar was taken in Kilburn, north London, in 1966. The pastel minidress, heavy fringe and costume jewellery feel instantly familiar as belonging to the era, but while we’re used to seeing a pallid Twiggy or Penelope Tree striding about London in fashion shoots from the same time, we rarely see images in which the model is black.
The pictures shown here of young women with 1960s-style beehives and miniskirts were shot as fashion stories for Drum , an influential anti-apartheid magazine based in Johannesburg, and Africa’s first black lifestyle magazine. …
Erlin Ibreck, the model in the main photograph who was 19 at the time, remembers Barnor asking her to pose in Trafalgar Square while flocks of excited pigeons landed on her. ‘I was more nervous about the pigeons than people around us who were staring.’
Some of the models were professional, but Ibreck was someone Barnor spotted in a bus queue at Victoria station. Ibreck was living in Cheshire but visiting her sister, who lived in London. Barnor asked if she would like to be photographed for Drum magazine and eventually she agreed.
Encouraged by Barnor, Ibreck enrolled at the Lucie Clayton modelling school in Manchester, but finding work as a black model in the 1960s was not easy.
‘It was very tough as there were very few black models,’ she says. ‘I was selected by Lucie Clayton to model De Beers diamonds – a South African company, and this was during apartheid. When they discovered that I was black De Beers cancelled the booking and chose a white model.
‘That booking would have enhanced my career, so it was a very painful experience to have been rejected on the basis of my colour. This experience made me realise what I was up against.’ After two years Ibreck gave up modelling and moved to New York.”
Although Barnor says he wasn’t consciously attempting to chronicle ‘black culture’ in England, and was simply taking photographs of things that interested him and the readers of Drum, the effect was, none the less, an optimistic suggestion that these cosmopolitan young African women were part of the exciting new, multicultural society in London that people were talking about.
Barnor’s memories of the time seem to be largely positive, and he says he doesn’t remember experiencing any overt racism. ‘I moved in enlightened circles so I did not have to put up with most of what other black people had to go through, though I did notice when I sat on a bus many people didn’t want to sit next to me’.”
Kate Salter. “Colour me beautiful: James Barnor’s photographs for Drum magazine,” on the Telegraph website 07 December 2010 [Online] Cited 08/10/2017. No longer available online
James Barnor (Ghanaian based in London, b. 1929) Wedding Guests, London (installation view) 1960s, printed 2010 Gelatin silver on paper Gift of Eric and Louise Franck London Collection 2013 Photo: Marcus Bunyan
James Barnor (Ghanaian based in London, b. 1929) Eva, London 1960s, printed 2010 Gelatin silver on paper Gift of Eric and Louise Franck London Collection 2013
This display brings together works from the 1960s and 1970s by eight photographers who documented Black communities in London: Raphael Albert, Bandele ‘Tex’ Ajetunmobi, James Barnor, Colin Jones, Neil Kenlock, Dennis Morris, Syd Shelton and Al Vandenberg.
The photographs reveal the many and varied experiences of individuals who travelled from the Caribbean region and West Africa to live in London, from everyday family life to political engagement. They show people as they respond to, react against and move beyond the racial tension and exclusion that were part of life for Black communities in the British capital. The title of the display, ‘Stan Firm inna Inglan’, is taken from the poem It Dread inna Inglan by Linton Kwesi Johnson, who in the 1970s gave a voice and poetic form to the Afro-Caribbean diaspora and its resistance in the face of racism. The poem expresses in Jamaican patois (creole) the resolve of African, Asian and Caribbean immigrants to ‘stand firm in England’, asserting the determination of Black British communities to remain in Britain and declare it as their rightful home.
The work of most of the photographers has gained prominence in recent years through the research and curatorial work of Autograph ABP, which was established in London in 1988 to advocate the inclusion of historically marginalised photographic practices. All works in the display have been gifted to the Tate collection and form part of the Eric and Louise Franck London Collection, an important collection of photography which was assembled over more than 20 years.
This display has been curated by Elena Crippa, Allison Thompson and Susana Vargas Cervantes. Alison and Susana worked at Tate as part of the Brooks International Fellowship programme for three months in 2016, fully funded by the Rory and Elizabeth Brooks Foundation and in partnership with the Delfina Foundation.
Text from the Tate Britain website
Dennis Morris (British, b. 1960) ‘Mother’s Pride’, Hackney (installation view) 1976, printed 2012 Gelatin silver print on paper Gift of Eric and Louise Franck London Collection 2016 Photo: Marcus Bunyan
Dennis Morris (British, b. 1960) Young Gun, Hackney (installation view) 1969, printed 2012 Gelatin silver print on paper Gift of Eric and Louise Franck London Collection 2016 Photo: Marcus Bunyan
Bandele Ajetunmobi (British, 1921-1994) Couple Kissing, Whitechapel, London (installation view) 1960s, printed 2012 Gelatin silver print on paper Gift of Eric and Louise Franck London Collection 2016 Photo: Marcus Bunyan
“Bandele Ajetunmobi – widely known as Tex – took photographs in the East End for almost half a century, starting in the late forties. He recorded a tender vision of interracial camaraderie, notably as manifest in a glamorous underground nightlife culture yet sometimes underscored with melancholy too – creating poignant portraits that witness an almost-forgotten era of recent history.
In 1947, at twenty-six years old, he stowed away on a boat from Nigeria – where he found himself an outcast on account of the disability he acquired from polio as a child – and in East London he discovered the freedom to pursue his life’s passion for photography, not for money or reputation but for the love of it.
He was one of Britain’s first black photographers and he lived here in Commercial St, Spitalfields, yet most of his work was destroyed when he died in 1994 and, if his niece had not rescued a couple of hundred negatives from a skip, we should have no evidence of his breathtaking talent. …
“He did all this photography yet he didn’t do it to make money, he did it for pleasure and for artistic purposes. He was doing it for art’s sake.He had lots of books of photography and he studied it. He was doing it because those things needed to be recorded. You fall in love with a medium and that’s what happened to him. He spent all his money on photography. He had expensive cameras, Hasselblads and Leicas. My mother said, ‘If you sold one, you could make a visit to Nigeria.’ But he never went back, he was probably a bit of an outcast because of his polio as a child and it suited him to be somewhere people didn’t judge him for that. …
He used to do buying and selling from a stall in Brick Lane. When he died, they found so much stuff in his flat, art equipment, pens, old records and fountain pens. He had a very good eye for things. Everybody knew him, he was always with his camera and they stopped him in the street and asked him to take their picture. He was able to take photographs in clubs, so he must have been a trusted and respected figure. Even if the subjects are poor, they are strutting their stuff for the camera. He gave them their pride and I like that.” (Victoria Loughran)
Bandele Ajetunmobi (British, 1921-1994) East End, London (installation view) c. 1975, printed 2012 C-print on paper Gift of Eric and Louise Franck London Collection 2016 Photo: Marcus Bunyan
Al Vanbenberg (American, 1932-2012) Untitled (installation view) c. 1975-1980 From the series On a Good Day Gelatin silver print on paper Gift of Eric and Louise Franck London Collection 2013 Photo: Marcus Bunyan
Al Vanbenberg (American, 1932-2012) Untitled c. 1975-1980 From the series On a Good Day Gelatin silver print on paper Gift of Eric and Louise Franck London Collection 2013 Photo: Marcus Bunyan
Al Vanbenberg (American, 1932-2012) Untitled (installation view) c. 1975-1980 From the series On a Good Day Gelatin silver print on paper Gift of Eric and Louise Franck London Collection 2013 Photo: Marcus Bunyan
Colin Jones (English, 1936-2021) From the series The Black House, 571 Holloway Road, London (installation views) 1976, printed 2012 Gelatin silver print on paper Gift Eric and Louise Franck London Collection 2016 Photo: Marcus Bunyan
Syd Shelton (British, b. 1947) Southhall Carnival against the Nazis (installation view) 1979, printed 2012 Gelatin silver print on paper Gift Eric and Louise Franck London Collection 2016 Photo: Marcus Bunyan
Syd Shelton (British, b. 1947) Jubilee Street, Stepney, London (installation view) 1977, printed 2012 Gelatin silver print on paper Gift Eric and Louise Franck London Collection 2016 Photo: Marcus Bunyan
Syd Shelton (British, b. 1947) Bagga (Bevin Fagan), Hackney, East London (installation view) 1979, printed 2012 Gelatin silver print on paper Gift Eric and Louise Franck London Collection 2016 Photo: Marcus Bunyan
Syd Shelton (British, b. 1947) Skinheads, Petticoat Lane, East London (installation view) 1979, printed 2012 Gelatin silver print on paper Gift Eric and Louise Franck London Collection 2016 Photo: Marcus Bunyan
Syd Shelton (British, b. 1947) Anti racist Skinheads, Hackney, London (installation view) 1979, printed 2012 Gelatin silver print on paper Gift Eric and Louise Franck London Collection 2016
Neil Kenlock (British born Jamaica, b. 1950) The Bailey Sisters in Clapham (installation view) c. 1970, printed 2010 Gelatin silver print on paper Presented by Tate Members 2013 and forming part of the Eric and Louise Franck London Collection Photo: Marcus Bunyan
Neil Kenlock (British born Jamaica, b. 1950) Demonstration outside Brixton Library (installation view) 1972, printed 2010 Gelatin silver print on paper Presented by Tate Members 2013 and forming part of the Eric and Louise Franck London Collection Photo: Marcus Bunyan
Neil Kenlock (British born Jamaica, b. 1950) ‘Keep Britain White’ graffiti, Balham (installation view) 1972, printed 2010 Gelatin silver print on paper Presented by Tate Members 2013 and forming part of the Eric and Louise Franck London Collection Photo: Marcus Bunyan
Raphael Albert (British born Grenada, 1935-2009) The Golden Chip, Hammersmith, London (installation view) c. 1970, printed 2012 Gelatin silver print on paper Gift Eric and Louise Franck London Collection 2016 Photo: Marcus Bunyan
Raphael Albert (British born Grenada, 1935-2009) Hammersmith, London (installation view) 1960s, printed 2012 Gelatin silver print on paper Gift Eric and Louise Franck London Collection 2016
Raphael Albert (British born Grenada, 1935-2009) The Harder They Come, Hammersmith Apollo (installation view) c. 1972, printed 2012 Gelatin silver print on paper Gift Eric and Louise Franck London Collection 2016
Raphael Albert (British born Grenada, 1935-2009) Holley posing at Blythe Road, London (installation view) c. 1974, printed 2012 Gelatin silver print on paper Gift Eric and Louise Franck London Collection 2016 Photo: Marcus Bunyan
Tate Britain Millbank, London SW1P 4RG United Kingdom Phone: +44 20 7887 8888
Exhibition dates: 19th August – 19th November 2017
Chief Curator: Xavier Canonne
René Magritte (Belgian, 1898-1967) Flirtatiousness (La coquetterie), René Magritte at the Jardin des Plantes, photo-booth photo 1929 Original photograph 43.2 x 33.2cm (framed) Private collection, Courtesy Brachot Gallery, Brussels
Extending the possibilities of the universe
When the chicken is not an egg (and vice versa)
They sent me 10 media images… and I could not get a handle on this exhibition. They sent me the superlative catalogue… and still I could not visualise this exhibition in my mind. Only by going and actually seeing this impressive exhibition in the beautifully refurbished spaces of Latrobe Regional Gallery do you really begin to understand its sangfroid – that Magritte’s photographs are a hyper-reality take on the mystery of the everyday, accomplished by the artist altering the very conception of what a photograph is.
Please note, I have included several juxtapositions in this posting which illuminate the pairing of photograph and small reproductions of Magritte’s painting in various sections of the exhibition for which I did not have the media images. This is because the reader can not get a good idea of the exhibition otherwise, and so I use these images under “fair use” conditions for the purposes of academic review, and to ensure that someone who cannot actually see the exhibition can begin to understand its import.
Small, often tiny photographs, usually no more than 2.5″ x 4″, are double mounted (which adds to the concentrated focus on the image) in black frames. Collectively, these images possess a certain aura and intensity while individually they exude a wonderful presence. Some photographs are toned, some not; some have irregular edges (as though cut from something else, some other fabric of time), others have deckled, wavy edges. Some photographs are cabinet cards, others carte-de-visite, or gelatin silver. Some of the photographs are so small, for example one titled The Earthquake (1942), and Dissuasion (1937) that you can hardly make out what is going on in the image. But then between these two small images is a slightly larger photograph titled The Feast of Stones (1942) where René Magritte, Paul Magritte and Marcel Mariën are eating bricks! There are portraits of friends and wives, there are serendipitous photographs or, more often, elaborately staged performances for the camera. They form an impressive body (which isn’t a body) in the gallery space.
Throughout the gallery some of the small photographs are printed large on canvas and these add a vital counterpoint for the eye, amongst the ocean of small images. Further, the exhibition then “…assists the viewer in connecting the images with Magritte’s art by hanging alongside small reproductions of key paintings framed in gilt baroque frames.” Small reproductions of some of Magritte’s paintings are housed in elaborate, wide, heavy gold frames hung between some of the small photographs, but the reproductions are poor and the elaborateness of the frames quite overrides the reproductions themselves. This is a jarring note in an otherwise excellent exhibition. The scale of the reproductions sets up a correlation between the physicality of the small photographs and that of the paintings which in reality does not exist. The paintings are much bigger and their surface texture – their flattened almost non-existent brushstrokes – are totally lacking in the reproductions. While there are only two Magritte paintings in institutional collections in Australia (The Lovers (1928) at the National Gallery of Australia and In praise of dialectics (1937) at the National Gallery of Victoria), this exhibition cried out for at least a couple of “real” Magritte paintings amongst the photographs, so that the difference and similarities of aura and physicality could be compared between the two. Whether a loan of both paintings was too expensive in terms of insurance and security I am unsure, but they needed to be there.
One of the first juxtapositions in the exhibition is a reproduction of Magritte’s painting The Lovers (1928) which is sequenced with his photograph, The Bouquet (1937) and a still from Sergei Eisenstein’s film Battleship Potemkin (1925) in which sailors, comrades all, are covered in a tarpaulin and just about to be shot. While most juxtapositions of photograph and painting in the exhibition illuminate the symbiotic relationship that existed between both (did the photograph influence the painting or was it the other way round? when the photograph exists as an art work in its own right but challenges through a twisting of reality the very notion of a documentary photography, are the chicken and the egg, the painting and the photograph, existentially linked?), this initial juxtaposition seems a little forced. Indeed, in the excellent beautifully produced catalogue the principal curator (Xavier Canonne), notes that the juxtapositions, “… are suppositions based on an interplay of analogies. If Magritte was aware of them, he would no doubt have rejected them, preferring to see them as fortuitous coincidences. It nonetheless remains that the universe of the mind is full of borrowings whose origin often remains unsuspected; exemplars buried in memory crop back up and recompose themselves through association.” Perhaps this was not the best example to begin the exhibition, with a painting of two people attempting to kiss each other through their grey cloth linked to comrades about to get shot.
After the grounding of the first two tranches of photographs, ‘A family album’ and ‘A family resemblance’, the exhibition takes flight with the remaining sections of the exhibition, beginning with the section ‘Resembling a painter’ in which the staged photographs “show how Magritte often tended to parody his work as a painter.” Here Magritte’s painting Attempting the Impossible (1928) is sequenced with a photograph of Magritte painting Attempting the Impossible (1928) and the photograph Love (1928) in which the artist pretends to paint his wife “in the flesh”, only this time she is clothed. As Xavier Canonne observes, “The painter permanently questioned reality, playing on its possibilities…” and the photographs do just that, resulting in “a different way of conceiving of photography, without trick shots or manipulation, of offering… a multiplying effect, an extension of what would otherwise have been merely a documentary image. Beyond the mise-en-abyme implemented by the interplay of the painting and its ‘model’, this photograph goes beyond the notion of document to lay claim to that of an intrinsic work.”
An example of this is Jacqueline Nonkels supervised, staged, photograph Rene Magritte painting Clairvoyance 4th October 1936 depicts Magritte painting Clairvoyance only for the painting to repeat the gesture of him painting in the photograph. Go figure – literally! Next to the small photograph is a reproduction of the painting Clairvoyance (1936) and Canonne observes that the self-portrait has become as much mise-en-abyme (placed into abyss: the visual experience of standing between two mirrors, then seeing as a result an infinite reproduction of one’s image; or the Droste effect, in which a picture appears within itself, in a place where a similar picture would realistically be expected to appear) as anything else. By subverting the documentary reality of photography it becomes something else and in so doing, becomes an intrinsic work in its own right. This transformative representation can happen within one image, or in a sequence of images, such as the pairing of the three forms of Love: the photograph Love; René Magritte painting ‘Attempting the Impossible’; and the painting Attempting the Impossible (all 1928, below). Other examples in different sections throughout the exhibition include The Oblivion Seller (1936), a small photograph from 1937 which is sequenced next to a reproduction of Magritte’s painting of his wife, Georgette (1937); or the photograph Rene Magritte and The Barbarian (1938) which is sequenced with The Flame Rekindled (1943) and a still from Ernst Moerman’s surrealist film Monsieur Fantômas (1937).
I feel that these tiny, tiny portraits are about extending the possibilities of the image through the joy of living. To play, to have fun with friends, to travel to places, to talk about ideas, about art and love and life, to debate the titles of images and paintings with comrades. In this regard, the interwar period and the avant-garde was immensely creative in terms of an investigation into the multiplicities of the world. The photographs are a reality take on the mystery of the everyday, a counterpoise to the severity and austerity of Magritte’s paintings. Paraphrasing Alfred Gell, who was recently quoted by Zara Stanhope in an essay on the cultural agency of photographs, I believe that not only do works of art “have the power to act and to influence others”1 they also have the power to act and influence each other through human agency. The production and titling of Magritte’s paintings and photographs was a collective and transformative process (undertaken with his group of friends), part of a reflective process that articulated the material conditions of a given situation (in this case, the Belgian Surrealist movement), in which the paintings and the photographs extend the possibility of being through an engagement with each other. For example, in The Death of Ghosts (1928) you really really have to look to try and understand what is going on within the picture frame. Even then, you wonder what is going on… the movement of the image, the darkness, the person lying in the background which is then linked to the painting The Apparition (1928) which uses the same silhouette of the figure, a trope that Magritte often uses when switching from photograph to canvas.
Throughout this wonderful exhibition you begin to formulate ideas as to how, firstly, the photograph is used as source material for Magritte’s art, as in the photograph for the painting Universal Gravitation (1943) where a man puts his hand through a wall (or is it the other way around, where the painting informs the photograph?) and, secondly, how the photograph is not used as a source material, but renegotiates the spatio-temporal dimensionality of the paintings. And becomes a new art work that stands by itself. And then you have to factor in the moving image: the sensibility of film, that movable feast of magic and masks, smoke and mirrors. By placing models, friends and paintings in the same photograph, Magritte’s images conflate time and space and ultimately challenge the concept of photography as a memory aid.
Finally, there is so much mystery pres(t)aged within these photographs (the titles further compounding the dissolution of reality), that the already fragile grasp of the referentiality of the image is shattered. Go travel and see this exhibition, for it was a true pleasure to spend a variable amount of time in their intimate, visceral, and intellectual, embrace.
Dr Marcus Bunyan
Word count: 1,715
Footnotes
1/ Alfred Gell cited in Stanhope, Zara. “Photography in Focus,” in McColm, Donna (ed.,). “Love from Paris,” National Gallery of Victoria magazine. Melbourne: September / October 2017, p. 50.
Many thankx to Latrobe Regional Art Gallery for allowing me to publish the photographs in the posting. Please click on the photographs for a larger version of the image.
“My paintings are … visible images which conceal nothing; they evoke mystery and, indeed, when one sees one of my pictures, one asks oneself this simple question, ‘What does that mean?’. It does not mean anything, because mystery means nothing either, it is unknowable.”
René Magritte
“For me, art is the means of evoking mystery… the mystery is the supreme thing. It’s reassuring to know that there’s mystery – to know that there is more than what one knows.”
René Magritte
“This triumphant poetry replaced the stereotyped effect of traditional painting. It is a complete rupture with the mental habits of artists imprisoned by talent, virtuosity and all the little aesthetic specialities. It is a new vision where viewers find their isolation and the silence of the world.”
“One rarely looks at images with the naked eye; a psychology, an aesthetic, a philosophy interpose themselves all in one; everything goes up in smoke. We question images before listening to them, we question them indiscriminately. Then we are surprised if the expected answer does not come.” (1944)
Paul Nougé
“Magritte’s art used images as a poet might use words; that is, in ways that new meanings, unnoticed harmonies, curious insights, subtle inflections and penetrating observations might be made. As with good poetry, they are not must made as ‘interesting’ asides, but create to feature as instances of heightened states of mind. Furthermore, like good poetry, Magritte’s images in painting, drawings, prints, films and photography have uplift. They promote thought and have an aesthetic punch that dislodges the all-too-common anaesthesia of incurious everyday life.”
Associate Professor Ken Wach. “René Magritte: Art as a Mental Act” in René Magritte: A Guide to René Magritte, Latrobe Regional Gallery, 2017, p. 13
The Surrealists made abundant use of photography, and some even devoted themselves to it entirely. But Magritte never considered himself a ‘photographer’ – he reserved this practice for special moments and specific uses: family photos; models for paintings and advertising work; photos of paintings in progress; and scenes improvised with friends, similar to the skits he later filmed with a home movie camera. Nevertheless, Magritte’s photographs and films are closely related to his paintings and demonstrate a similar method in their grasp on reality. Far from being merely entertaining occasional images, they shed a familiar light on the painter’s thought and evidence the same investigation of the mysteries of the world.
Installation views of the exhibition René Magritte: The Revealing Image at the Latrobe Regional Art Gallery Installation photography by Benjamin Hosking
“And although it may not refer to a specific painting, Virtue Rewarded, a photograph taken in Brussels in 1934, preserves Magritte’s iconography for all time with a silhouette – the painter himself – in a hat and long coat in front of a suburban landscape, the recurring image of the anonymous man in Magritte’s world.”
~ Xavier Canonne
Unknown photographer Virtue Rewarded 1934, Brussels Original photograph
Introduction from the book
“The discovery of the photographs and films of René Magritte in the mid-1970s, more than 10 years after the painter’s death, and their subsequent appraisal and study have given us a look into a family album that reveals an intimate side of Magritte, independent of the biographical documents unearthed from his archives and those of people he was close to. This discovery has also led to an investigation of Magritte’s relationship with these ‘other images’, for which he served as creator, director and model, and of his relationship with the mediums of photography and cinema, to which, in his experience as a painter, he assigned a role of both recreation and creation.” ~ Xavier Canonne.
Description of the exhibition
The exhibition René Magritte: The Revealing Image, Photos and Films consists of 132 original photographs from the archives of the painter and those closest to him, presented in six sections, and eight self-made films. The photographs are organised thematically, eschewing strict chronology, each section introduced by a text, the individual photographs including a caption and a comment. They are accompanied by enlargements in the form of posters and, depending on the section, by reproductions of Magritte’s paintings or films, or by films which made an impression on him.
A Family Album
The photographs in this section, arranged chronologically, are devoted to Magritte’s family life. Snaps taken with his parents and brothers, his military service, the early years of his marriage to Georgette, their period of residence at Perreux-sur-Marne near Paris, their life in Brussels – all revealing the daily life of René Magritte.
A Family Resemblance
Organised chronologically, this section brings together photographs representing René Magritte’s other “family”, the Brussels Surrealist group with which the painter threw in his lot in 1926. Paul Nougé, Marcel Lecomte, Louis Scutenaire, Irène Hamoir, Paul Colinet, Marcel Mariën, Camille Goemans and Marthe Beauvoisin are some of the characters who feature in these compositions, in many cases improvised “photographic tableaux” bearing witness to the intimate relationship between René Magritte and his immediate circle.
The Resemblance of Painting
This third section of the exhibition consists of photographs of René Magritte at his easel, covering the years from 1917 to 1965. They show the painter with works from different periods, taken impromptu or posing, generally in a suit, in the succession of houses where he never established a workshop, preferring to paint in his living-room. Working documents or “staged” photographs, they show how Magritte often tended to parody his work as a painter.
Reproduction Permitted or Photography Enhanced
This section of the exhibition comprises paintings by Magritte placed on his easel or forming the background of portraits of him and his wife. Essential paintings, some of which have been lost, provide the painter with a stage set into which he projects himself with his wife, going beyond documentary photography.
This section also includes a series of photographs which served as models for his paintings, featuring Georgette and René Magritte, Louis Scutenaire and various close friends – photographs directly connected with his works, which are presented in the form of reproductions. Magritte used the same procedure in the short films he made between 1940 and 1960, and extracts in television format or reproductions are shown alongside the original photographs.
The Imitation of Photography. Magritte and the Cinema[tograph]
The cinema, more even than painting and to the same extent as literature, was a seminal influence of the work of René Magritte. As a child, he had been exposed to the first silent films and he tried to recreate their freshness and spontaneity in the short films he made, featuring his close friends. Magritte may still be posing in this section, but the emphasis is on entertainment.
This section of the exhibition is accompanied by extracts from his own films, presented on the TV screens, and by images from films by directors he admired, such as Louis Feuillade with his celebrated Fantômas.
The False Mirror
This title of a celebrated painting by René Magritte opens the final section of the exhibition. Consisting essentially of portraits of Magritte at different stages of his life, they sometimes depict him in dreamy mood, sometimes expressing amusement, generally with his eyes closed, focused inwards. The section also includes photographs in which the painter and his friends mask their faces or turn away from the camera lens, prolonging in photographic mode his painterly research on the caché-visible (things hidden in plain sight).
Section 1: A Family Album
The photographs in this section, arranged chronologically, are devoted to Magritte’s family life. Snaps taken with his parents and brothers, his military service, the early years of his marriage to Georgette, their period of residence at Perreux-sur-Marne near Paris, their life in Brussels – all revealing the daily life of René Magritte.
Unknown photographer Georgette and René Magritte, Brussels, June 1922 [on their wedding day] 1922 Original photograph 43.2 x 33.2cm (framed) Private collection, Courtesy Brachot Gallery, Brussels
Installation view of the exhibition René Magritte: The Revealing Image at the Latrobe Regional Art Gallery with at left, Régina Bertinchamps, René Magritte’s mother by an unknown photograper, Nd; and at right, Léopold Magritte and Régina Bertinchamps, Lessines, 1898 also by an unknown photographer.
René Magritte (Belgium, 1898-1967) Les Amants [The lovers] 1928 Oil on canvas Collection of Richard S. Zeisler, New York
Reproduction in the exhibition Published under “fair use” for the purposes of academic review
This is one of a small group of pictures painted by Magritte in Paris in 1927-28, in which the identity of the figures is mysteriously shrouded in white cloth. The group of paintings includes L’histoire centrale (The central story) 1927 (collection Isy Brachot, Brussels); L’invention de la vie (The invention of life) 1927-28 (private collection, Brussels); The lovers 1928 in the Australian National Gallery; and the similarly titled, similarly dated and similarly sized painting in the collection of Richard S. Zeisler, New York, in which the same shrouded heads of a man and a woman that appear in the Gallery’s painting attempt to kiss each other through their grey cloth integuments.
The origin of this disturbing image has been attributed to various sources in Magritte’s imagination. Like many of his Surrealist associates, Magritte was fascinated by ‘Fantômas’, the shadowy hero of the thriller series which first appeared in novel form in 1913, and shortly after in films made by Louis Feuillade. The identity of ‘Fantômas’ is never revealed; he appears in the films disguised with a cloth or stocking over his head. Another source for the shrouded heads in Magritte’s paintings has been suggested in the memory of his mother’s apparent suicide. In 1912, when Magritte was only thirteen years of age, his mother was found drowned in the river Sambre; when her body was recovered from the river, her nightdress was supposedly wrapped around her head.
Michael Lloyd & Michael Desmond. European and American Paintings and Sculptures 1870-1970 in the Australian National Gallery 1992 p.173.
Unknown photographer The Bouquet (Le Bouquet), Georgette and René Magritte, Rue Esseghem, Brussels 1937 Original Photograph 43.2 x 33.2cm (framed) Private collection, Courtesy Brachot Gallery, Brussels
Section 2: A Family Resemblance
Organised chronologically, this section brings together photographs representing René Magritte’s other “family”, the Brussels Surrealist group with which the painter threw in his lot in 1926. Paul Nougé, Marcel Lecomte, Louis Scutenaire, Irène Hamoir, Paul Colinet, Marcel Mariën, Camille Goemans and Marthe Beauvoisin are some of the characters who feature in these compositions, in many cases improvised “photographic tableaux” bearing witness to the intimate relationship between René Magritte and his immediate circle.
Unknown photographer The Hunters’ Gathering (La rendez-vous de chase) 1934 Original photograph 27 x 33cm (framed) Collection Charly Herscovici, Europe
Left to right: E.L.T Mesens, René Magritte, Louis Scutenaier, André Souris and Paul Nougé Seated: Iréne Hamoir, Marthe Beauvoisin and Georgette Magritte. Studio Joe Rentmeesters
Installation view of the exhibition René Magritte: The Revealing Image at the Latrobe Regional Art Gallery with at left, René Magritte’s The Correspondance Group, 1928 (Paul Nougé, Marcel Lecomte and Camille Goemans), paired with René Magritte’s Portrait of Paul Nougé, 1927 at right.
René Magritte (Belgium, 1898-1967) Portrait of Paul Nougé 1927 Oil on canvas
Reproduction in the exhibition Published under “fair use” for the purposes of academic review
Unknown photographer The Extraterresterials V (detail) 1935, Brussels, Rue Esseghem
Left to right: Paul Colinet, Marcel Lecomte, Georgette and René Magritte
Published under “fair use” for the purposes of academic review
Unknown photographer Saluting the Flag 1935, Koksijde Original photograph
Left to right: Paul Colinet, René Magritte, Louis Scutenaire, Paul Nougé, and Paul Magritte
Section 3: The Resemblance of Painting
This third section of the exhibition consists of photographs of René Magritte at his easel, covering the years from 1917 to 1965. They show the painter with works from different periods, taken impromptu or posing, generally in a suit, in the succession of houses where he never established a workshop, preferring to paint in his living-room. Working documents or “staged” photographs, they show how Magritte often tended to parody his work as a painter.
Unknown photographer René Magritte painting The Empty Mask (Le masque vide), Le Perreux-sur-Marne 1928 Original photograph 32 x 38cm (framed) Collection Charly Herscovici, Europe
Unknown photographer Love 1928, Le Perreux-sur-Marne Study for Attempting the Impossible Original photograph
Published under “fair use” for the purposes of academic review
Unknown photographer René Magritte painting ‘Attempting the Impossible’ 1928, Le Perreux-sur-Marne Original photograph
Published under “fair use” for the purposes of academic review
René Magritte (Belgium, 1898-1967) Attempting the Impossible 1928 Oil on canvas
Reproduction in the exhibition Published under “fair use” for the purposes of academic review
Jacqueline Nonkels René Magritte painting ‘Clairvoyance’ Brussels, 4 October 1936 Original photograph
Published under “fair use” for the purposes of academic review
René Magritte (Belgium, 1898-1967) Clairvoyance 1936 Oil on canvas
Reproduction in the exhibition Published under “fair use” for the purposes of academic review
Magritte has set up his easel in the small courtyard leading to the garden on Rue Essenghem. On it sits a completed painting, Clairvoyance, which represents Magritte seated in front of a canvas, brush in hand, his face turned towards an egg resting on a table covered with a tablecloth to his left. But the painted image in this photographic model is a bird with spread wings. Magritte, in a perfect imitation – suit, palette, haircut and chair – is in turn seated in front of he painting, pretending to paint. The photograph, taken on 4 October 1936 by young Jacqueline Nonkels according to instructions and staging established by Magritte, seems as much self-portrait as mise-en-abyme. It is the result of a different way of conceiving of photography, without trick shots or manipulation, of offering… a multiplying effect, an extension of what would otherwise have been merely a documentary image. Beyond the mise-en-abyme implemented by the interplay of the painting and its ‘model’, this photograph goes beyond the notion of document to lay claim to that of an intrinsic work.
Xavier Canonne. “The Resemblance of Painting,” in René Magritte: The Revealing Image, Photos and Films. LaTrobe Regional Gallery, 2017, p. 72.
Section 4: Reproduction Permitted or Photography Enhanced
This section of the exhibition comprises paintings by Magritte placed on his easel or forming the background of portraits of him and his wife. Essential paintings, some of which have been lost, provide the painter with a stage set into which he projects himself with his wife, going beyond documentary photography.
This section also includes a series of photographs which served as models for his paintings, featuring Georgette and René Magritte, Louis Scutenaire and various close friends – photographs directly connected with his works, which are presented in the form of reproductions. Magritte used the same procedure in the short films he made between 1940 and 1960, and extracts in television format or reproductions are shown alongside the original photographs.
Unknown photographer The Holy Family 1928, Le Perreux-sur-Marne Original photograph
Published under “fair use” for the purposes of academic review
“Magritte’s photographs attest to a form of improvisation, offering a compromise between a portrait of those around him and the reproduction of his own painting by somehow effecting their merger: The Holy Family shows the painter and his wife sitting on either side of the painting The Windows of Dawn (1928), with The Obsession (1928) placed on the easel above them.”
Xavier Canonne. “Reproduction permitted or photography enhanced,” in René Magritte: The Revealing Image, Photos and Films. LaTrobe Regional Gallery, 2017, p. 98.
Paul Nougé (Belgian, 1895-1967) The Seers c. 1930 Marthe Beauvoisin and Georgette Magritte
Published under “fair use” for the purposes of academic review
Paul Nougé attributed (Belgian, 1895-1967) The Shadow and Its Shadow (L’ombre et son ombre) 1932, Brussels Georgette and René Magritte Original photograph 41.2 x 33.2cm (framed) Private collection, Courtesy Brachot Gallery, Brussels
“The Shadow and Its Shadow is indeed a photographic painting, an autonomous work that Magritte could also have transferred to canvas in treating the theme of the ‘hidden-invisible’.”
~ Xavier Canonne
René Magritte (Belgian, 1898-1967) Faraway looks c. 1927 Oil on canvas
Reproduction in the exhibition Published under “fair use” for the purposes of academic review
René Magritte (Belgian, 1898-1967) The Oblivion Seller (detail) 1936 Georgette Magritte Original photograph Cover image for the catalogue to the exhibition
Published under “fair use” for the purposes of academic review
René Magritte (Belgian, 1898-1967) Georgette 1937 Oil on canvas Museé Magritte, Brussels
Painting not in exhibition but reproduced in catalogue Published under “fair use” for the purposes of academic review
“Taken on the Belgian Coast in 1936, The Oblivion Seller (as Scutenaire aptly named it) shows a spontaneity and opportuneness completed in the mind of the painter, who often represented himself with his eyes closed, as if lost in thought. The ‘deflection’ of his snapshot of a happy moment – woman one loves at the beach on holiday – seems to prefigure certain later paintings, the nearest of which chronologically is Georgette (1937), an oval portrait that she kept her whole life… The painter permanently questioned reality, playing on its possibilities, assigning objects and beings a similar presence on film or canvas, the ‘default scene’ never quite satisfying him.”
Xavier Canonne. “Reproduction permitted or photography enhanced,” in René Magritte: The Revealing Image, Photos and Films. LaTrobe Regional Gallery, 2017, p. 106.
René Magritte (Belgian, 1898-1967) Universal Gravitation 1943 Oil on canvas Private collection
Painting reproduced in exhibition Published under “fair use” for the purposes of academic review
René Magritte (Belgian, 1898-1967) The Destroyer 1943 Louis Scutenaire Original photograph
Published under “fair use” for the purposes of academic review
René Magritte (Belgian, 1898-1967) The Healer 1937 Oil on canvas René Magritte/ Charly Herscovici c/o SABAM
Painting not in exhibition but reproduced in catalogue Published under “fair use” for the purposes of academic review
René Magritte (Belgian, 1898-1967) God, The Eighth Day 1937 Brussels, Rue Essenghem Original photograph René Magritte/ Courtesy Brachot Gallery, Brussels
Published under “fair use” for the purposes of academic review
René Magritte (Belgian, 1898-1967) The Death of Ghosts 1928, Le Perreux-sur-Marne Jacqueline Celcourt-Nonkels and René Magritte René Magritte/ Courtesy Brachot Gallery, Brussels
Published under “fair use” for the purposes of academic review
“Although the silhouette of a man (probably Magritte) in The Death of Ghosts (1928) appears in the painting The Apparition (1928), other photos differ from the final painting, or were in turn inspired by it, the exact chronological sequence in these cases being less certain.”
~ Xavier Canonne
René Magritte (Belgian, 1898-1967) The Apparition 1928 Oil on canvas Staatsgalerie, Stutgart René Magritte/ Charly Herscovici c/o SABAM
Painting reproduced in exhibition Published under “fair use” for the purposes of academic review
René Magritte (Belgian, 1898-1967) Queen Semiramis (La reine Sémiramis) 1947, Brussels Original photograph 41.2 x 33.2cm (framed) Private collection, Courtesy Brachot Gallery, Brussels
René Magritte (Belgian, 1898-1967) Perfect Harmony 1947 Oil on canvas René Magritte/ Charly Herscovici c/o SABAM
Painting not in exhibition but reproduced in catalogue Published under “fair use” for the purposes of academic review
René Magritte (Belgian, 1898-1967) The Meeting (Le Rendez-vous) 1938, Brussels Original photograph 43.2 x 33.2cm (framed) Private collection, Courtesy Brachot Gallery, Brussels
René Magritte: The Revealing Image, Photos and Films is a world-first exhibition which provides stunning insight into the life, work and thinking of René Magritte, one of the world’s most important 20th Century artists. The exhibition, to be held at Latrobe Regional Galley in Morwell, Victoria, Australia from 19 August to 19 November 2017, features 130 original photographs by and of Magritte, his family, friends and fellow artists. It also includes eight self-made films which give a behind-the-scenes view of Magritte’s world. This exhibition, staged in collaboration with the Magritte Foundation Belgium. René Magritte: The Revealing Image, Photos and Films, marks the 50th anniversary of the Belgian Surrealist’s death. After its world-premiere in Morwell, René Magritte: The Revealing Image, Photos and Films will travel to Hong Kong, North and South America, and back to Europe.
Latrobe Regional Galley director Dr Mark Themann said René Magritte: The Revealing Image, Photos and Films was an opportunity to experience an amazing assembly of intimate and insightful photographs and films, many of which have never been exhibited previously. “Magritte had a unique creative ability to enchant. He used the ordinary and the everyday to evoke the mysterious and to question our perceptions of reality,” Dr Themann said. “He is an iconic artist, whose influence on fellow artists, designers, film directors and visual culture continues to this day. It’s a magnificent opportunity to present this major international exhibition in our newly-renovated Latrobe Regional Galley in Morwell. We’re looking forward to welcoming visitors from the local region, around Australia, and the world.”
Exhibition Chief Curator Xavier Canonne said the discovery of the photographs and films of René Magritte in the mid-1970s, 10 years after the painter’s death, and their subsequent appraisal and study, had given us an even greater appreciation of Magritte as an artist. “There are a lot of connections between Magritte’s photos and films, and his famous paintings,” Mr Canonne said. “Magritte was deeply interested by the possibilities of the image. The photos and films were used as models or documents for his paintings, and as experimental fields for his research, in order to find something more – to extend the possibilities of his universe. Through this exhibition we gain a greater sense and understanding of who Magritte was, how this informed his work, and why his art is so important.”
In conjunction with the opening of René Magritte: The Revealing Image, Photos and Films a book on the exhibition by Mr Canonne has been published by Ludion, distributed globally by Thames & Hudson.
Press release from the Latrobe Regional Art Gallery
Section 5: The Imitation of Photography. Magritte and the Cinema[tograph]
The cinema, more even than painting and to the same extent as literature, was a seminal influence of the work of René Magritte. As a child, he had been exposed to the first silent films and he tried to recreate their freshness and spontaneity in the short films he made, featuring his close friends. Magritte may still be posing in this section, but the emphasis is on entertainment.
This section of the exhibition is accompanied by extracts from his own films, presented on the TV screens, and by images from films by directors he admired, such as Louis Feuillade with his celebrated Fantômas.
Unknown photographer René Magritte and The Barbarian (Le Barbare), London Gallery, London 1938 Original photograph 43.2 x 33.2cm (framed) Private collection, Courtesy Brachot Gallery, Brussels
René Magritte (Belgian, 1898-1967) The Flame Rekindled 1943 Oil on canvas Private collection
Reproduction in the exhibition Published under “fair use” for the purposes of academic review
Ernst Moerman (Belgian, 1897-1944) Monsieur Fantômas 1937 Film still
Published under “fair use” for the purposes of academic review
“These examples are suppositions based on an interplay of analogies. If Magritte was aware of them, he would no doubt have rejected them, preferring to see them as fortuitous coincidences. It nonetheless remains that the universe of the mind is full of borrowings whose origin often remains unsuspected; exemplars buried in memory crop back up and recompose themselves through association. It is more an atmosphere that is evoked here, in particular that of the silent movies, with a power of images that impressed the painter move than photographs, at a time when the silver screen, this mysterious wellspring, was as much a source of this power as the mirror.”
Xavier Canonne. “The imitation of photography. Magritte and the cinema[tograph],” in René Magritte: The Revealing Image, Photos and Films. LaTrobe Regional Gallery, 2017, p. 126.
Unknown photographer On the Road to Texas 1942, Brussels
Left to right: Agui Ubac, Irène Hamoir, Louis Scutenaire, Jacqueline Nonkels, Georgette and René Magritte
René Magritte – surrealistic home movie Nd
Not in the exhibition
Louis Feuillade (French, 1873-1925) Fantômas 1913
Not in the exhibition
Louis Feuillade (French, 1873-1925) was a prolific and prominent French film director from the silent era. Between 1906 and 1924 he directed over 630 films. He is primarily known for the serials Fantômas, Les Vampires and Judex.
The Fantômas serial in 1913 was his first masterpiece, the result of a long apprenticeship – during which the series with realistic ambitions, Life as it is, played a major role. It is also the first masterpiece in what the modern critic, from both a literary and a cinematographic point of view, would later call “the fantastic realism” or the “social fantastic”. He is credited with developing many of the thriller techniques used famously by Fritz Lang, Alfred Hitchcock, and others.
The series consists of five episodes, each an hour to an hour and a half in length, which end in cliffhangers, i.e., episodes one and three end with Fantômas making a last-minute escape, the end of the second entry has Fantômas blowing up Lady Beltham’s manor house with Juve and Fandor, the two heroes, still inside. The subsequent episodes begin with a recap of the story that has gone before. Each film is further divided into three or more chapters that do not end in cliffhangers.
This title of a celebrated painting by René Magritte opens the final section of the exhibition. Consisting essentially of portraits of Magritte at different stages of his life, they sometimes depict him in dreamy mood, sometimes expressing amusement, generally with his eyes closed, focused inwards. The section also includes photographs in which the painter and his friends mask their faces or turn away from the camera lens, prolonging in photographic mode his painterly research on the caché-visible (things hidden in plain sight).
Unknown photographer René Magritte 1930 Original photograph
Published under “fair use” for the purposes of academic review
Unknown photographer The Eminence Grise 1938 René Magritte on the Belgian coast Original photograph
Published under “fair use” for the purposes of academic review
“Again at the Belgian Coast in 1938, by now in keeping with an established ritual, Magritte, having hooked an open book to the straps of his bathing suit, turns aways from the camera (The Eminence Grise).”
~ Xavier Canonne
Éminence grise: a person who exercises power or influence in a certain sphere without holding an official position.
Unknown photographer The Gladness of the Day August 1935, Lessines Original photograph Georgette Magritte, Louis Scutenaire, René Magritte
Published under “fair use” for the purposes of academic review
René Magritte (Belgium, 1898-1967) The Giant (Le Géant), Paul Nougé on the Belgian Coast 1937 Private collection, Courtesy Brachot Gallery, Brussels Original photograph 41.2 x 33.2cm (framed)
“Paul Nougé shields his face behind a chessboard, forcing the viewer to concentrate on the details of his clothing and the pipe he holds in his hand. Scutenaire entitled this photo The Giant, an apt title for the anti-portrait of the man who was the soul of the Brussels Surrealist group and never stopped calling for a self-effacement that favoured maximum freedom.”
~ Xavier Canonne
Paul Nougé (1895-1967), was a Belgian poet, founder and theoretician of surrealism in Belgium, sometimes known as the “Belgian Breton”. …
In November 1924 he created the journal “Correspondance”, which published 26 pamphlets up to September 1925, in collaboration with Camille Goemans and Marcel Lecomte. In July 1925 he was expelled from the party. That same year Nougé met the French surrealists, Louis Aragon, André Breton and Paul Éluard, and together they signed the tract “La Révolution d’abord et toujours” (The Revolution First and Forever), and made the acquaintance of Louis Scutenaire in 1926. September of that same year marked the drafting of the constitution of the Belgian Surrealist Group that comprised Nougé, Goemans, René Magritte, E. L. T. Mesens and André Souris.
In 1927 Nougé composed plagiarised examples of a grammar book of Clarisse Juranville, illustrated with 5 drawings by Magritte. In 1928 he founded the magazine “Distances” and wrote the poem catalogue of a fur trader that was illustrated by Magritte entitled “Le catalogue Samuel” (re-edited by Didier Devillez, Brussels, 1996). He also wrote the preface of a Magritte exhibition at the gallery “L’époque” (signed by his ‘accomplices’ Goemans, Mesens, Lecomte, Scutenaire and Souris) and delivered in January 1929 to Charleroi – a conference on the accompanying music to a concert conducted by Souris and an exhibition of Magritte (“La conférence de Charleroi”, published in 1946). Between December 1929 and February 1930 Nougé created 19 photographs, unpublished until 1968, under the title “Subversion des images”. These photographs have been displayed notably, and most recently, at the Edinburgh Art Festival 2009. In 1931 he wrote the preface to an exhibition which followed the return of Magritte to Brussels. Extracts from “Images défendues” were published in 1933 in issue number 5 of “Surréalisme au service de la Révolution”. In 1934 Nougé co-signed “L’action immédiate” in “Documents 34”, edited by Mesens. In 1935 “Le Couteau dans la plaie” (‘The Knife in the Wound’) was published and in 1936, René Magritte ou la révélation objective was published in “Les Beaux-Arts” in Brussels. In that same year, Nougé, along with Mesens, organised the exclusion of Souris from the group.
Nougé was mobilised in 1939 in Mérignac then Biarritz, during World War II, as a military nurse. In 1941 Nougé prefaced an exhibition, quickly closed by the occupying forces, of photographs by Raoul Ubac in Brussels L’expérience souveraine (The Sovereign Experience). In 1943 he published the complete text of René Magritte ou Les images défendues. In January 1944, under the pseudonym of Paul Lecharantais, he prefaced a new exhibition of Magritte that was criticised by the collaborators of nazism. In 1945 Nougé participated in the exhibition “Surréalisme” organised by the Editions La Boétie de Bruxelles gallery. In 1946 he published La Conférence de Charleroi and, under the title Élémentaires a preface for the exhibition of Magritte “Le Surréalisme en Plein Soleil” (Surrealism in Full Sunlight) at the Dietrich gallery.
Shunk Kender (Harry Shunk and Janos Kender) René Magritte and The Likeness (La Resemblance) (from The Eternally Obvious) about 1962 Private collection, Courtesy Brachot Gallery, Brussels Original photograph 41.2 x 33.2cm
“And in the living room on Rue des Mimosas, for the photographer Skunk Kender, Magritte traded his face for a panel from The Eternally Obvious (1954), replacing his features with those of a woman’s face, here again accomplishing the transmutation of a painting by a photograph: the painter substitutes his silhouette in a three-piece suit for the fragmented woman’s body in the original painting and disappears behind his work.”
~ Xavier Canonne
Shunk-Kender
The photographers Harry Shunk (German, 1924-2006) and János Kender (Hungarian, 1937-2009) worked together under the name Shunk-Kender from the late 1950s to the early 1970s, based first in Paris and then in New York. Shunk-Kender photographed artworks, events, and landmark exhibitions of avant-garde movements of the era, from Nouveau réalisme to Earth art. They were connected with a vibrant art scene that they captured through portraits of artists and participated in through collaborative projects.
The roles played by the duo varied from one project to the next. In some cases, Shunk-Kender worked as documentarians, photographing Happenings and performances; in other instances, they were collaborators, acting alongside other artists to realise works of art through photography.
Shunk Kender (Harry Shunk and Janos Kender) René Magritte in front of ‘Le sens de réalité’ 1960 Private collection, Courtesy Brachot Gallery, Brussels Original photograph 43.2 x 33.2cm
Latrobe Regional Art Gallery 138 Commercial Road Morwell, Victoria 3840 Australia
![Jakob Tuggener (Swiss, 1904-1988) 'Autoritratto, Zurigo [Self-portrait, Zurich]' 1927 from the exhibition Exhibition: 'Jakob Tuggener – Machine time' at Fotostiftung Schweiz, Winterthur, Zurich, Oct 2017 - Jan 2018](https://artblart.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/01/jakob-tuggener-autoritratto-zurigo-1927-web.jpg "Jakob Tuggener (Swiss, 1904-1988) 'Autoritratto, Zurigo [Self-portrait, Zurich]' 1927 from the exhibition Exhibition: 'Jakob Tuggener – Machine time' at Fotostiftung Schweiz, Winterthur, Zurich, Oct 2017 - Jan 2018")
![Jakob Tuggener (Swiss, 1904-1988) 'Nell'ufficio della fonderia, fabbrica di costruzioni meccaniche Oerlikon' [In the foundry office, Oerlikon mechanical engineering factory] 1937](https://artblart.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/01/jakob-tuggener-nellufficio-della-fonderia-web.jpg "Jakob Tuggener (Swiss, 1904-1988) 'Nell'ufficio della fonderia, fabbrica di costruzioni meccaniche Oerlikon' [In the foundry office, Oerlikon mechanical engineering factory] 1937")
![Jakob Tuggener (Swiss, 1904-1988) 'Navy Cut, Ateliers de construction mécanique Oerlikon (MFO)' [Navy Cut, Machine Shops Oerlikon (MFO)] 1940](https://artblart.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/01/tuggener-navy-cut-web.jpg "Jakob Tuggener (Swiss, 1904-1988) 'Navy Cut, Ateliers de construction mécanique Oerlikon (MFO)' [Navy Cut, Machine Shops Oerlikon (MFO)] 1940")
![Jakob Tuggener (Swiss, 1904-1988) 'Laboratorio di ricerca, fabbrica di costruzioni meccaniche Oerlikon' [Research laboratory, Oerlikon mechanical engineering factory] 1941](https://artblart.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/01/jakob-tuggener-laboratorio-di-ricerca-web.jpg "Jakob Tuggener (Swiss, 1904-1988) 'Laboratorio di ricerca, fabbrica di costruzioni meccaniche Oerlikon' [Research laboratory, Oerlikon mechanical engineering factory] 1941")
![Jakob Tuggener (Swiss, 1904-1988) 'Forgeron dans une fabrique de wagons de Schlieren' [Blacksmith in a Schlieren wagon factory] 1949](https://artblart.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/01/tuggener-forgeron-dans-une-fabrique-de-wagons-web.jpg "Jakob Tuggener (Swiss, 1904-1988) 'Forgeron dans une fabrique de wagons de Schlieren' [Blacksmith in a Schlieren wagon factory] 1949")
![Jakob Tuggener (Swiss, 1904-1988) 'Ballo ungherese, Grand Hotel Dolder, Zurigo, 1935' [Hungarian dance, Grand Hotel Dolder, Zurich, 1935] 1935](https://artblart.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/01/tuggener-ballo-ungherese-web.jpg "Jakob Tuggener (Swiss, 1904-1988) 'Ballo ungherese, Grand Hotel Dolder, Zurigo, 1935' [Hungarian dance, Grand Hotel Dolder, Zurich, 1935] 1935")
![Jakob Tuggener (Swiss, 1904-1988) 'Ballo ungherese, Grand Hotel Dolder, Zurigo, 1935' [Hungarian dance, Grand Hotel Dolder, Zurich, 1935] 1935](https://artblart.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/01/jakob-tuggener-ballo-ungherese-web.jpg "Jakob Tuggener (Swiss, 1904-1988) 'Ballo ungherese, Grand Hotel Dolder, Zurigo, 1935' [Hungarian dance, Grand Hotel Dolder, Zurich, 1935] 1935")
![Judith Crispin (Australian / Bpangerang, b. 1970) 'Four Kurdu-kurdu [Kids] with Trampoline' 2015](https://artblart.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/10/four-kurdu-kurdu-kids-with-trampoline-web.jpg "Judith Crispin (Australian / Bpangerang, b. 1970) 'Four Kurdu-kurdu [Kids] with Trampoline' 2015")
![Judith Crispin (Australian / Bpangerang, b. 1970) 'Wirntali-Jarra [Friends]' 2015](https://artblart.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/11/wirntali-jarra-friends-web.jpg "Judith Crispin (Australian / Bpangerang, b. 1970) 'Wirntali-Jarra [Friends]' 2015")
![William Herman Rau (1855-1920) 'Untitled [Clarence H. White works in Second Philadelphia Photographic Salon installation]' 1899](https://artblart.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/clarence-h-white-works-in-second-philadelphia-photographic-salon-installation-1899-web.jpg "William Herman Rau (1855-1920) 'Untitled [Clarence H. White works in Second Philadelphia Photographic Salon installation]' 1899")
![Clarence H. White (American, 1871-1925) 'Spring - A Triptych [Letitia Felix]' 1898](https://artblart.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/clarence-h-white-spring-web.jpg "Clarence H. White (American, 1871-1925) 'Spring - A Triptych [Letitia Felix]' 1898")
![Clarence H. White (American, 1871-1925) 'Spring - A Triptych [Letitia Felix]' 1898](https://artblart.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/clarence-h-white-spring-a-triptych-1898-web.jpg "Clarence H. White (American, 1871-1925) 'Spring - A Triptych [Letitia Felix]' 1898")
![Clarence H. White (American, 1871-1925) 'Spring - A Triptych [Letitia Felix]' 1898](https://artblart.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/clarence-h-white-spring-a-triptych-1898-b-web.jpg "Clarence H. White (American, 1871-1925) 'Spring - A Triptych [Letitia Felix]' 1898")
![Clarence H. White (American, 1871-1925) 'Untitled [Male academic nude]' c. 1900](https://artblart.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/clarence-h-white-untitled-male-academic-nude-c-1900-web.jpg "Clarence H. White (American, 1871-1925) 'Untitled [Male academic nude]' c. 1900")
![Clarence H. White (American, 1871-1925) 'Untitled [Portrait of F. Holland Day with Male Nude]' 1902](https://artblart.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/clarence-h-white-portrait-of-f-holland-day-with-male-nude-1902-platinum-print-web.jpg "Clarence H. White (American, 1871-1925) 'Untitled [Portrait of F. Holland Day with Male Nude]' 1902")
![Clarence H. White (American, 1871-1925) 'Untitled [F. Holland Day lighting a cigarette]' 1902](https://artblart.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/clarence-h-white-untitled-f-holland-day-lighting-a-cigarette-1902-web.jpg "Clarence H. White (American, 1871-1925) 'Untitled [F. Holland Day lighting a cigarette]' 1902")
![Clarence H. White (American, 1871-1925) 'The Boy with His Wagon [1/3]' 1898](https://artblart.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/clarence-h-white-boy-web.jpg "Clarence H. White (American, 1871-1925) 'The Boy with His Wagon [1/3]' 1898")
![Clarence H. White (1871-1925) 'Untitled [Jean Reynolds in Newark, Ohio]' c. 1905](https://artblart.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/clarence-h-white-untitled-jean-reynolds-in-newark-ohio-c-1905-web.jpg "Clarence H. White (1871-1925) 'Untitled [Jean Reynolds in Newark, Ohio]' c. 1905")
![Clarence H. White (American, 1871-1925) 'Untitled [Interior of Weiant house, Newark, Ohio]' 1904](https://artblart.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/clarence-h-white-untitled-interior-of-weiant-house-newark-ohio-1904-web.jpg "Clarence H. White (American, 1871-1925) 'Untitled [Interior of Weiant house, Newark, Ohio]' 1904")
![Clarence H. White (American, 1871-1925) and Paul Burty Haviland (French, 1880-1950) 'Untitled [Florence Peterson]' 1909, printed after 1917](https://artblart.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/white-haviland-untitled-florence-peterson-1909-printed-after-1917-web.jpg "Clarence H. White (American, 1871-1925) and Paul Burty Haviland (French, 1880-1950) 'Untitled [Florence Peterson]' 1909, printed after 1917")
![Alfred Stieglitz (American, 1864-1946) and Clarence H. White (American, 1871-1925) 'Untitled [Miss Thompson]' 1907](https://artblart.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/stieglitz-and-white-untitled-miss-thompson-1907-web.jpg "Alfred Stieglitz (American, 1864-1946) and Clarence H. White (American, 1871-1925) 'Untitled [Miss Thompson]' 1907")
![Clarence H. White (American, 1871-1925) 'Untitled [Florence Peterson]' c. 1909](https://artblart.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/clarence-h-white-untitled-florence-peterson-c-1909-web.jpg "Clarence H. White (American, 1871-1925) 'Untitled [Florence Peterson]' c. 1909")
![Margaret Watkins (Canadian, 1884-1969) 'Untitled [Kitchen still life]' c. 1919-1920](https://artblart.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/margaret-watkins-untitled-kitchen-still-life-c-1919-20-web.jpg "Margaret Watkins (Canadian, 1884-1969) 'Untitled [Kitchen still life]' c. 1919-1920")
![Clarence H. White (American, 1871-1925) 'Untitled [Dome of the Church of Our Lady of Carmen, San Ángel, Mexico]' 1925](https://artblart.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/clarence-h-white-dome-of-the-church-of-our-lady-of-carmen-1925-web.jpg "Clarence H. White (American, 1871-1925) 'Untitled [Dome of the Church of Our Lady of Carmen, San Ángel, Mexico]' 1925")
![Unknown photographer. 'Untitled [Aboriginal ceremony]' c. 1892](https://artblart.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/11/a-collection-of-five-photographs-nicholas-caire-and-unknown-photographers-king-billy-maloga-aboriginal-native-group-aboriginals-lake-tyers-aborignal-ceremony-d-web.jpg "Unknown photographer. 'Untitled [Aboriginal ceremony]' c. 1892")
![J. W. Lindt. 'Untitled [Two men in rural Victoria]' c. 1880s](https://artblart.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/11/a-collection-of-18-photographs-depicting-rural-scenes-in-victoria-circa-1880s-men-web.jpg "J. W. Lindt. 'Untitled [Two men in rural Victoria]' c. 1880s")
![Unknown photographer. 'Untitled [Australian Aborigines in chains]' Nd](https://artblart.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/11/australian-aborigines-c-web.jpg "Unknown photographer. 'Untitled [Australian Aborigines in chains]' Nd")
![Unknown photographer. 'Untitled [Aboriginal man smoking a pipe]' Nd](https://artblart.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/11/artist-unknown-aboriginal-man-smoking-a-pipe-web.jpg "Unknown photographer. 'Untitled [Aboriginal man smoking a pipe]' Nd")
![Unknown photographer. 'Untitled [Aboriginal making fire]' Nd](https://artblart.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/11/anonymous-photographer-aboriginal-making-fire-nd-web.jpg "Unknown photographer. 'Untitled [Aboriginal making fire]' Nd")
![Anonymous photographer. 'Untitled [Aboriginal with spear]' Nd](https://artblart.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/11/anonymous-photographer-aboriginal-with-spear-nd-web.jpg "Anonymous photographer. 'Untitled [Aboriginal with spear]' Nd")
![Anonymous photographer. 'Untitled [Aboriginal with scars]' Nd](https://artblart.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/11/anonymous-photographer-aboriginal-with-scars-nd-web.jpg "Anonymous photographer. 'Untitled [Aboriginal with scars]' Nd")
![Anonymous photographer. 'Untitled [Aboriginal group]' Nd](https://artblart.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/11/anonymous-photographer-aboriginal-group-nd-web.jpg "Anonymous photographer. 'Untitled [Aboriginal group]' Nd")
![Anonymous photographer. 'Untitled [Aboriginal family group]' Nd](https://artblart.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/11/anonymous-photographer-aboriginal-family-group-nd-web.jpg "Anonymous photographer. 'Untitled [Aboriginal family group]' Nd")
![Hermann and Marianne Aubel (authors) Karl Robert Langewiesche (publisher) 'Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit [The Artistic Dance of Our Time]' 1928](https://artblart.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/book-cover-web.jpg "Hermann and Marianne Aubel (authors) Karl Robert Langewiesche (publisher) 'Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit [The Artistic Dance of Our Time]' 1928")
![Elvira (Munich) 'Isadora Duncan' from Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit [The Artistic Dance of Our Time] p. 1 Published 1928](https://artblart.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/isadora-duncan-p1-web11.jpg "Elvira (Munich) 'Isadora Duncan' from Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit [The Artistic Dance of Our Time] p. 1 Published 1928")
![Rudolf Jobst (Austrian, 1872-1952) 'Schwestern Wiesenthal [Wiesenthal sisters]' c. 1928 from Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit [The Artistic Dance of Our Time] p. 4 Published 1928](https://artblart.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/schwestern-wiesenthal-p4-web2.jpg "Rudolf Jobst (Austrian, 1872-1952) 'Schwestern Wiesenthal [Wiesenthal sisters]' c. 1928 from Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit [The Artistic Dance of Our Time] p. 4 Published 1928")
![Hugo Erfurth (German, 1874-1948) 'Schwestern Wiesenthal [Wiesenthal sisters]' c. 1928 from Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit [The Artistic Dance of Our Time] p. 5 Published 1928](https://artblart.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/schwestern-wiesenthal-p5-web2.jpg "Hugo Erfurth (German, 1874-1948) 'Schwestern Wiesenthal [Wiesenthal sisters]' c. 1928 from Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit [The Artistic Dance of Our Time] p. 5 Published 1928")
![Hugo Erfurth (German, 1874-1948) 'Grete Wiesenthal' c. 1928 from Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit [The Artistic Dance of Our Time] p. 6 Published 1928](https://artblart.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/grete-wiesenthal-p6-web2.jpg "Hugo Erfurth (German, 1874-1948) 'Grete Wiesenthal' c. 1928 from Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit [The Artistic Dance of Our Time] p. 6 Published 1928")
![Rudolf Jobst (Vienna) 'Else Wiesenthal' c. 1928 from Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit [The Artistic Dance of Our Time] p. 7 Published 1928](https://artblart.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/else-wiesenthal-p7-web2.jpg "Rudolf Jobst (Vienna) 'Else Wiesenthal' c. 1928 from Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit [The Artistic Dance of Our Time] p. 7 Published 1928")
![Hanns Holdt (German, 1887-1944) 'Sent M'Ahesa' c. 1928 from Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit [The Artistic Dance of Our Time] p. 10 Published 1928](https://artblart.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/sent-m-ahesa-p10-web1.jpg "Hanns Holdt (German, 1887-1944) 'Sent M'Ahesa' c. 1928 from Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit [The Artistic Dance of Our Time] p. 10 Published 1928")
![Franz Löwy (Austrian, 1883-1949) 'Sent M'Ahesa' c. 1928 from Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit [The Artistic Dance of Our Time] p. 11 Published 1928](https://artblart.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/sent-m-ahesa-p11-web1.jpg "Franz Löwy (Austrian, 1883-1949) 'Sent M'Ahesa' c. 1928 from Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit [The Artistic Dance of Our Time] p. 11 Published 1928")
![Hugo Erfurth (German, 1874-1948) 'Sent M'Ahesa' c. 1928 from Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit [The Artistic Dance of Our Time] p. 12 Published 1928](https://artblart.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/sent-m-ahesa-p12-web1.jpg "Hugo Erfurth (German, 1874-1948) 'Sent M'Ahesa' c. 1928 from Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit [The Artistic Dance of Our Time] p. 12 Published 1928")
![d'Ora (Arthur Benda) (Vienna) 'Sent M'Ahesa' c. 1928 from Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit [The Artistic Dance of Our Time] p. 13 Published 1928](https://artblart.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/sent-m-ahesa-p13-web1.jpg "d'Ora (Arthur Benda) (Vienna) 'Sent M'Ahesa' c. 1928 from Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit [The Artistic Dance of Our Time] p. 13 Published 1928")
![Hugo Erfurth (German, 1874-1948) 'Sent M'Ahesa' c. 1928 from Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit [The Artistic Dance of Our Time] p. 14 Published 1928](https://artblart.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/sent-m-ahesa-p14-web1.jpg "Hugo Erfurth (German, 1874-1948) 'Sent M'Ahesa' c. 1928 from Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit [The Artistic Dance of Our Time] p. 14 Published 1928")
![Hanns Holdt (Munich) 'Sent M'Ahesa' c. 1928 from Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit [The Artistic Dance of Our Time] p. 15 Published 1928](https://artblart.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/sent-m-ahesa-p15-web1.jpg "Hanns Holdt (Munich) 'Sent M'Ahesa' c. 1928 from Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit [The Artistic Dance of Our Time] p. 15 Published 1928")
![Hanns Holdt (German, 1887-1944) 'Sent M'Ahesa' c. 1928 from Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit [The Artistic Dance of Our Time] p. 16 Published 1928](https://artblart.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/sent-m-ahesa-p16-web1.jpg "Hanns Holdt (German, 1887-1944) 'Sent M'Ahesa' c. 1928 from Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit [The Artistic Dance of Our Time] p. 16 Published 1928")
![Franz Löwy (Austrian, 1883-1949) 'Sent M'Ahesa' c. 1928 from Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit [The Artistic Dance of Our Time] p. 17 Published 1928](https://artblart.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/sent-m-ahesa-p17-web1.jpg "Franz Löwy (Austrian, 1883-1949) 'Sent M'Ahesa' c. 1928 from Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit [The Artistic Dance of Our Time] p. 17 Published 1928")
![Hanns Holdt (German, 1887-1944) 'Sent M'Ahesa' c. 1928 from Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit [The Artistic Dance of Our Time] p. 18 Published 1928](https://artblart.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/sent-m-ahesa-p18-web1.jpg "Hanns Holdt (German, 1887-1944) 'Sent M'Ahesa' c. 1928 from Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit [The Artistic Dance of Our Time] p. 18 Published 1928")
![Minya Diez-Dührkoop (German, 1873-1929) 'Clotilde von Derp-Sacharoff' c. 1928 from Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit [The Artistic Dance of Our Time] p. 19 Published 1928](https://artblart.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/clotilde-von-derp-sacharoff-p19-web1.jpg "Minya Diez-Dührkoop (German, 1873-1929) 'Clotilde von Derp-Sacharoff' c. 1928 from Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit [The Artistic Dance of Our Time] p. 19 Published 1928")
![Hugo Erfurth (German, 1874-1948) 'Clotilde von Derp-Sacharoff' c. 1928 from Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit [The Artistic Dance of Our Time] p. 20 Published 1928](https://artblart.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/clotilde-von-derp-sacharoff-p20-web1.jpg "Hugo Erfurth (German, 1874-1948) 'Clotilde von Derp-Sacharoff' c. 1928 from Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit [The Artistic Dance of Our Time] p. 20 Published 1928")
![Hugo Erfurth (German, 1874-1948) Clotilde von Derp-Sacharoff c. 1928 from Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit [The Artistic Dance of Our Time] p. 21 Published 1928](https://artblart.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/clotilde-von-derp-sacharoff-p21-web1.jpg "Hugo Erfurth (German, 1874-1948) Clotilde von Derp-Sacharoff c. 1928 from Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit [The Artistic Dance of Our Time] p. 21 Published 1928")
![Hugo Erfurth (German, 1874-1948) 'Clotilde von Derp-Sacharoff' c. 1928 from Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit [The Artistic Dance of Our Time] p. 23 Published 1928](https://artblart.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/clotilde-von-derp-sacharoff-p23-web2.jpg "Hugo Erfurth (German, 1874-1948) 'Clotilde von Derp-Sacharoff' c. 1928 from Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit [The Artistic Dance of Our Time] p. 23 Published 1928")
![Hugo Erfurth (German, 1874-1948) 'Clotilde von Derp-Sacharoff' c. 1928 from Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit [The Artistic Dance of Our Time] p. 26 Published 1928](https://artblart.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/clotilde-von-derp-sacharoff-p26-web2.jpg "Hugo Erfurth (German, 1874-1948) 'Clotilde von Derp-Sacharoff' c. 1928 from Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit [The Artistic Dance of Our Time] p. 26 Published 1928")
![Atelier Veritas (Munich) (Stephanie Held-Ludwig) (German born Schaulen, Russia now Lithuania, 1871-1943) 'Clotilde von Derp-Sacharoff' c. 1928 from Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit [The Artistic Dance of Our Time] p. 27 Published 1928](https://artblart.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/clotilde-von-derp-sacharoff-p27-web1.jpg "Atelier Veritas (Munich) (Stephanie Held-Ludwig) (German born Schaulen, Russia now Lithuania, 1871-1943) 'Clotilde von Derp-Sacharoff' c. 1928 from Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit [The Artistic Dance of Our Time] p. 27 Published 1928")
!['Nijinski' From the works "The Russian Theater", Amalthea-Verlag, Vienna c. 1928 from Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit [The Artistic Dance of Our Time] p. 28 Published 1928](https://artblart.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/nijinski-p28-web1.jpg "'Nijinski' From the works \"The Russian Theater\", Amalthea-Verlag, Vienna c. 1928 from Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit [The Artistic Dance of Our Time] p. 28 Published 1928")
!['Nijinski' Portrait cards Verlag Leiser, Berlin - Wilmersdorf c. 1928 from Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit [The Artistic Dance of Our Time] p. 29 Published 1928](https://artblart.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/nijinski-p29-web2.jpg "'Nijinski' Portrait cards Verlag Leiser, Berlin - Wilmersdorf c. 1928 from Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit [The Artistic Dance of Our Time] p. 29 Published 1928")
![E. O. Hoppé (British, 1878-1972) 'Nijinski' c. 1928 from Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit [The Artistic Dance of Our Time] p. 30 Published 1928](https://artblart.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/nijinski-p30-web2.jpg "E. O. Hoppé (British, 1878-1972) 'Nijinski' c. 1928 from Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit [The Artistic Dance of Our Time] p. 30 Published 1928")
!['Nijinski' From the works "The Russian Theater", Amalthea-Verlag, Vienna c. 1928 from Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit [The Artistic Dance of Our Time] p. 31 Published 1928](https://artblart.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/nijinski-p31-web2.jpg "'Nijinski' From the works \"The Russian Theater\", Amalthea-Verlag, Vienna c. 1928 from Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit [The Artistic Dance of Our Time] p. 31 Published 1928")
!['Nijinski' Portrait cards Verlag Leiser, Berlin - Wilmersdorf c. 1928 from Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit [The Artistic Dance of Our Time] p. 32 Published 1928](https://artblart.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/nijinski-p32-web1.jpg "'Nijinski' Portrait cards Verlag Leiser, Berlin - Wilmersdorf c. 1928 from Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit [The Artistic Dance of Our Time] p. 32 Published 1928")
!['Nijinski' From the works "The Russian Theater", Amalthea-Verlag, Vienna c. 1928 from Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit [The Artistic Dance of Our Time] p. 33 Published 1928](https://artblart.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/nijinski-p33-web1.jpg "'Nijinski' From the works \"The Russian Theater\", Amalthea-Verlag, Vienna c. 1928 from Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit [The Artistic Dance of Our Time] p. 33 Published 1928")
!['Nijinski' From the works "The Russian Theater", Amalthea-Verlag, Vienna c. 1928 from Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit [The Artistic Dance of Our Time] p. 35 Published 1928](https://artblart.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/nijinski-p35-web2.jpg "'Nijinski' From the works \"The Russian Theater\", Amalthea-Verlag, Vienna c. 1928 from Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit [The Artistic Dance of Our Time] p. 35 Published 1928")
![d'Ora (Arthur Benda) (Vienna) 'Anna Pavlova' c. 1928 from Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit [The Artistic Dance of Our Time] p. 36 Published 1928](https://artblart.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/anna-pavlova-p-36-web1.jpg "d'Ora (Arthur Benda) (Vienna) 'Anna Pavlova' c. 1928 from Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit [The Artistic Dance of Our Time] p. 36 Published 1928")
![Hänse Herrmann (German, 1864-1932) 'Anna Pavlova' c. 1928 from Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit [The Artistic Dance of Our Time] p. 37 Published 1928](https://artblart.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/anna-pavlova-p-37-web1.jpg "Hänse Herrmann (German, 1864-1932) 'Anna Pavlova' c. 1928 from Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit [The Artistic Dance of Our Time] p. 37 Published 1928")
![Hänse Herrmann (German, 1864-1932) 'Anna Pavlova' c. 1928 from Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit [The Artistic Dance of Our Time] p. 38 Published 1928](https://artblart.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/anna-pavlova-p-38-web1.jpg "Hänse Herrmann (German, 1864-1932) 'Anna Pavlova' c. 1928 from Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit [The Artistic Dance of Our Time] p. 38 Published 1928")
![Hänse Herrmann (German, 1864-1932) 'Anna Pavlova' c. 1928 from Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit [The Artistic Dance of Our Time] p. 39 Published 1928](https://artblart.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/anna-pavlova-p-39-web1.jpg "Hänse Herrmann (German, 1864-1932) 'Anna Pavlova' c. 1928 from Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit [The Artistic Dance of Our Time] p. 39 Published 1928")
![Hänse Herrmann (German, 1864-1932) 'Anna Pavlova' c. 1928 from Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit [The Artistic Dance of Our Time] p. 40 Published 1928](https://artblart.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/anna-pavlova-p-40-web3.jpg "Hänse Herrmann (German, 1864-1932) 'Anna Pavlova' c. 1928 from Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit [The Artistic Dance of Our Time] p. 40 Published 1928")
![Hänse Herrmann (German, 1864-1932) 'Anna Pavlova' c. 1928 from Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit [The Artistic Dance of Our Time] p. 41 Published 1928](https://artblart.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/anna-pavlova-p-41-web3.jpg "Hänse Herrmann (German, 1864-1932) 'Anna Pavlova' c. 1928 from Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit [The Artistic Dance of Our Time] p. 41 Published 1928")
![Hänse Herrmann (German, 1864-1932) 'Anna Pavlova' c. 1928 from Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit [The Artistic Dance of Our Time] p. 42 Published 1928](https://artblart.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/anna-pavlova-p-42-web1.jpg "Hänse Herrmann (German, 1864-1932) 'Anna Pavlova' c. 1928 from Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit [The Artistic Dance of Our Time] p. 42 Published 1928")
![Hänse Herrmann (German, 1864-1932) 'Anna Pavlova' c. 1928 from Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit [The Artistic Dance of Our Time] p. 43 Published 1928](https://artblart.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/anna-pavlova-p-43-web2.jpg "Hänse Herrmann (German, 1864-1932) 'Anna Pavlova' c. 1928 from Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit [The Artistic Dance of Our Time] p. 43 Published 1928")
![Ernst Schneider (German, 1881-1959) 'Anna Pavlova' c. 1928 from Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit [The Artistic Dance of Our Time] p. 44 Published 1928](https://artblart.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/anna-pavlova-p-44-web1.jpg "Ernst Schneider (German, 1881-1959) 'Anna Pavlova' c. 1928 from Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit [The Artistic Dance of Our Time] p. 44 Published 1928")
![E. O. Hoppé (British, 1878-1972) 'Anna Pavlova' c. 1928 from Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit [The Artistic Dance of Our Time] p. 45 Published 1928](https://artblart.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/anna-pavlova-p-45-web1.jpg "E. O. Hoppé (British, 1878-1972) 'Anna Pavlova' c. 1928 from Der Kunstlerische Tanz Unserer Zeit [The Artistic Dance of Our Time] p. 45 Published 1928")
![Walter Mittelholzer (Swiss, 1894-1937) 'Wilde Schlussszene des Opfertanzes [Wild final scene of the sacrificial dance]' 1926-1927](https://artblart.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/11/lbs_mh02-03-0084-a-web.jpg "Walter Mittelholzer (Swiss, 1894-1937) 'Wilde Schlussszene des Opfertanzes [Wild final scene of the sacrificial dance]' 1926-1927")
![Walter Mittelholzer (Swiss, 1894-1937) 'Fremdenverkehr vor der Sphinx [Tourism in front of the Sphinx]' 1929](https://artblart.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/11/lbs_mh02-07-0161-web.jpg "Walter Mittelholzer (Swiss, 1894-1937) 'Fremdenverkehr vor der Sphinx [Tourism in front of the Sphinx]' 1929")
![Walter Mittelholzer (Swiss, 1894-1937) 'Itu-Mann vom Südosten Abessiniens [Itu man from southeastern Abyssinia]' c. 1934](https://artblart.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/11/lbs_mh02-22-0756-web.jpg "Walter Mittelholzer (Swiss, 1894-1937) 'Itu-Mann vom Südosten Abessiniens [Itu man from southeastern Abyssinia]' c. 1934")
![Walter Mittelholzer (Swiss, 1894-1937) 'Dankali-Mädchen [Dankali girl]' c. 1934](https://artblart.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/11/lbs_mh02-22-0775-web.jpg "Walter Mittelholzer (Swiss, 1894-1937) 'Dankali-Mädchen [Dankali girl]' c. 1934")
![Walter Mittelholzer (Swiss, 1894-1937) 'Flugplatz in Addis Abeba [Airfield in Addis Ababa]' c. 1934](https://artblart.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/11/lbs_mh02-22-0778-web.jpg "Walter Mittelholzer (Swiss, 1894-1937) 'Flugplatz in Addis Abeba [Airfield in Addis Ababa]' c. 1934")
![Peter Elfes (Australia, b. 1961) 'Brenton [Heath-Kerr] as Tom of Finland' 1992](https://artblart.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/11/elfes-brenton-heath-kerr-web.jpg "Peter Elfes (Australia, b. 1961) 'Brenton [Heath-Kerr] as Tom of Finland' 1992")
![Unknown photographer. 'Untitled [Auschwitz victim]' Nd](https://artblart.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/11/unknown-photographer-untitled-auschwitz-victim-nd-web.jpg "Unknown photographer. 'Untitled [Auschwitz victim]' N")
![René Magritte (Belgium 1898-1967) 'Les Amants [The lovers]' 1928](https://artblart.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/10/magritte-the-lovers-web.jpg "René Magritte (Belgium 1898-1967) 'Les Amants [The lovers]' 1928")
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