Month: May 2016

Weegeee (1899 – 1968)

 

Rarely have photographers’ careers been as celebrated and honored as Weegee’s. Equally illustrious and renowned as his pictures was Weegee‘s persona, which heralded him as the world’s most famous photographer. For most of his early career Weegee was unrelenting in capturing New York’s seemingly endless affairs. From the grandiose halls of the Metropolitan Opera House to the unsophisticated sanctuary of Sammy’s Bar, the congregation of inquisitive spectators to the abrupt silence of a gangland murder, Weegee navigated the labyrinth of New York’s streets, documenting its untold life.

 

For an intense decade between 1935 and 1946, Weegee was one of the most relentlessly inventive figures in American photography. Renowned for his ability to be at the scene before anyone else, he dominated the New York landscape. In his own mind, he was the only individual, a cigar wielding visual narrator, who could tell the story of this restless city.

 

In late 2012, Ryan Adams, a photojournalist expert, discovered the archive in a Midwest storage facility where it had been housed since its purchase in 1994. The following collaboration with Daniel Blau has resulted not only in the current presentation of vintage Weegee prints but also in the 2015 exhibition of early works by Margaret Bourke-White and the recent museum exhibition: Robert Capa – Kriegsfotografien 1943-1945 at the Kupferstich-Kabinett Dresden. Many of the photographs were exhibited for the first time, or first recognized as works by these famous photographs.

 

Our researches even brought forward that Weegee was already working as a photographer in 1925. Finally Weegee’s photographs get the attention and fame they deserve in history of photography.

 

Selected recent exhibitions

 

2019
Weegee – The Famous, Oct 18, 2018 – Jan 20, 2019, Mai Manó House, Budapest, Hungary
 

2017
Extra!Weegee, Apr 07 – May 28, Fotografiska, Stockholm, Sweden

 

2015
Weegee by Weegee, Photographs from the Jean Pigozzi Collection, Sept 05 – Nov 08, The Baker Museum, Naples Florida, USA

 

2013
Weegee. Murder is My Business, May 02 – July 28, Fondazione Palazzo Magnani, Reggio Emilia, Italy

 

2012
Weegee. Murder is My Business, Jan 20 – Sept 02, International Center of Photography, New York, USA

 

2006
Scene of the Crime, Sept 20, 2005 – Jan 22, 2006, Getty Museum, Los Angeles, USA

 
 

Selected publications

 

2017
Extra! Weegee, Hirmer Verlag

 

2014
The Weegee Guide to New York, Philomena Mariani and Christopher George

 

2013
Weegee: Murder Is My Business, Brian Wallis and Philomena Mariani

 

1978
Weegee Täter und Opfer, John Coplan

 

1945
Naked City, Weegee (Arthur Fellig)

June 16, 2016 — June 19, 2016

 

“All art is a revolt against man’s fate.”

 

From André Malraux, The Voices of Silence, 1953, Princeton: University Press, Reissued 1978, p. 639

 

 

Daniel Blau is pleased to present an enticing selection of “dirty pictures” at this year’s Art Basel.

 

Beginning with George Grosz (1893 – 1959), the penetrating draftsman whose acerbic wit created unique visions of the  Weimar Republic. His drawings show explicit sexual scenes between couples as well as daring ménages-à-trois. Stylistically, Grosz’s drawings are candid and expressive – every line is considered.  His pioneering style, subject-matter and technique lay the foundations for seminal artists of the 1960s such as de Kooning, Johns, Warhol and Rauschenberg.  These dirty pictures, exhibited here for the first time, offer a rare glimpse into Grosz’s intimate world. His work perfected the art of dissecting the insides of his own, as well as society’s soul.

 

Continuing with works on paper, this year’s exhibition will bring an equally exciting selection of Andy Warhol’s (1928 -1987) early Nude and Dick drawings that study the human form, providing us with unparalleled insight into the early career of one of the 20th century’s most important artists. These works on paper reveal a lesser-known side of  Warhol’s, one founded in European art history and reminiscent of early 20th century masters such as Schiele, Dix, Grosz, Klee and Klimt.

 

Furthermore we are proud to present a small selection of vintage, heavily retouched photographs that idealise their subject matter. Gouache and airbrush retouching was a technique used from the 1920s onwards, where editors would retouch prints directly in preparation for their wide-spread dissemination through the printing press. These prints are unique works that testify their handling and offer us visual clues to their ‘reproductive’ purpose. By bringing together fact and fiction these artworks are impressive results of the pictorial universe and its unquenchable thirst for PICTURES! Never meant to be seen – these works show exciting and different types of secret, “dirty pictures” they are a delightful combination of drawing and photography.

 

Nobuyoshi  Araki (*1940) is the Japanese photographer. He is perhaps best known for shooting naked girls in bondage or playing with a range of plastic dinosaurs and other toys. We present his work in a collection of polaroids showing flowers – innocent yet highly suggestive. Iconic, mythical, a medium in his own right , Araki’s art boldly shows life’s beauty and brutality with a remarkable directness. These polaroid pictures reflect his hallmark style which is deliberate, yet casual.  “Rather than shooting something that looks like a professional photograph, I want my work to feel intimate, like someone in the subject’s inner circle shot them”.  These unique pictures show the ephemeral nature of beauty and photography’s power in capturing it.

 

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