The Art Basel Miami week will be the most important single event in the photography world, as well as the American art world. In total well over 165-175 dealers will be selling photography in their booths at the various Miami shows in December from Tuesday the 4th through Sunday the 9th.

But the bulk of the contemporary photography action will take place at one location between two massive and elegant tents set up in the Wynwood Art District at NW 31st and North Miami Avenue. AIPAD's Photography Show Miami and Artfair's Photo Miami will total over 105 photography exhibitors between them, far outpacing any other competing shows.

Miami in December is must event for any serious curator or collector. And, if last year's event was any indication, the weather will be balmy and the city and its beaches will be tempting, frantic and fun. Over 50,000 people are expected, so make your reservations now.

My own company, Contemporary Works/Vintage Works, which is located in suburban Philadelphia and available by private appointment, will exhibit new work from a dozen international artists at the new AIPAD (Association of International Photography Art Dealers) Photography Show Miami this December 4-9, 2007.

Many of our featured artists are expected to be in attendance at various times during the show. Their images are on our website at http://www.contemporaryworks.net .

We will also show a key selection of top 20th-century vintage masterworks, including work from Irving Penn, Man Ray, Raoul Ubac, Edward Steichen, Alfred Stieglitz, Francois Kollar, Brassai, Henri Cartier-Bresson, Walker Evans, Horst, Josef Sudek, Edward Weston and Edouard Boubat. Because of our focus on contemporary work at this show, please make sure you call us now (1-215-822-5662) if you want us to bring a particular photograph to the show.

The primary contemporary artists and their work on display at the Miami show include:

--Arthur Tress, who is considered by many to be one of the greatest living contemporary art photographers, will show his large-scale color work based on now destroyed installations that he created in New York City and Paris. This installation work--most of which Tress himself pulled together and spray painted in an abandoned hospital on New York's Welfare Island--is a largely unknown facet of this artist's extensive career, because the hospital was torn down without the work being shown to the public. The photographs are the only documentation of these stunning compositions and are prime examples of some of the cross-fertilization of different art forms/media that has taken place over the last few decades. Contemporary Works will also show a sampling of his classical black and white photographs in large prints. Tress, whose work has been featured at many important museum venues, including a major retrospective at the Corcoran Gallery of Art in 2001, continues to work on the cutting edge with new work focused on paint-ball warfare and skate-board competitions. His new "Pointers" black and white series will also be available to view at the Contemporary Works' booth. Tress says about this work, "Pointers are a series of photographs made in the past two years that are done at a 45 degree angle. This creates a diamond shape format, much as Mondrian's "Lozenge" paintings. Shooting in this unusual shape changes the photographic boarder from one of containment and framing to one of dynamic cutting and asymmetrical segments." (Tress is expected to be at the show from Dec. 6-10.) See examples of his work at: http://www.contemporaryworks.net/artists/artist_imgs.php/1/6606 .

-- Lisa Holden is a British artist based in Amsterdam. She has exhibited in London, the United States and throughout Europe. Holden's color photo works succeed in seamlessly combining two media that are frequently considered at opposite poles: the digital and the hand-painted. In her compositions, which sample imagery from early studio photography, classical painting, performance art and consumer culture, Holden has developed a painstaking technique of combining footage from digital still and video cameras with scanned-in, hand-tinted layers, making it impossible to distinguish any overlap. Integrating the digital artefacts randomly generated by the repeated layering process into the final composition, her portrait becomes obscured, iterating the artist’s ongoing interest in alternate personas and constructed reality. The finishing of Holden's large-scale pieces, which drip with lush abstract acrylic paints and varnishes, balances the rival interests of digital and analogue media, new and traditional imagery, realism and fantasy. Holden's work has been recently featured in cover articles in FOTO (Sweden) and CameraArts (USA), as well in other major articles in Eyemazing (Netherlands), New York Arts (USA) and Focus (USA) magazines. The latter magazine's latest issue compares her work to that of Cindy Sherman, Pipilotti Rist and Tracey Moffatt. "But", the article continues, "Holden's imagery stands apart with her interest in themes of identity and gender combined with fantasy and art historical precedents, as well as for her unique process that merges photography with painting and sometimes installation and performance art." Contemporary Works will be showing a just-finished painted three-part series on Danae, who was mother of Perseus by Zeus. The story has classical art roots as well, with both Titian and Rembrandt interpreting the subject. (Holden is expected to be at the show from Dec. 4-9.) See examples of her work at: http://www.contemporaryworks.net/artists/artist_imgs.php/1/4205 .

--Michael A. Smith's work has been included in over 200 exhibitions. In addition, he has twice received fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts, and he has been the recipient of major commissions to photograph four American cities. In 1981, Smith's first book, the two-volume monograph, "Landscapes 1975–1979", was awarded Le Grand Prix du Livre at the Rencontres Internationale de la Photographie in Arles, France. In 1992, Smith was honored with a 25-year retrospective exhibition at the International Museum of Photography at the Eastman House in Rochester, NY. To mark the occasion, "Michael A Smith: A Visual Journey--Photographs from Twenty-Five Years" was published. Smith's newest work--so fresh it is still unpublished, but will be shown in Miami for the first time--is a color series on Inmates who have been charged with capital crimes. (Smith is expected to be at the show from Dec. 4-7.) See examples of his work at: http://www.contemporaryworks.net/artists/artist_imgs.php/1/6804 .

--Claudia Kunin has intermittently had exhibitions of her personal work while pursuing a career in commercial photography. A partial client list includes: AT&T, American Express, Wells Fargo Bank, Concorde Pictures, Pfizer Pharmaceuticals, Ford Motor Co., Sprint Communications, Rolling Stone, Martha Stewart, Wm. Morrison and Penguin Books. She is now solely pursuing her fine art and has a number of bodies of accomplished work, including: "Revenant", "Ghost Stories" and "Holy Ghost Stories", the latter of which Contemporary Works will be exhibiting for the first time as near life-size color photographs at the Miami show. Much like the manner of painters who would make their background images from a book of sketches, Kunin constructs her backgrounds from various photographs she has taken all over the world. She then shoots the models in the studio to illustrate the allegorical tale, and afterwards knits the picture together from all the various elements. These powerful archetypal images are virtually unique in contemporary art. As Kunin says, "The composite images in the series are portals, thresholds between this world and the 'other'. They tell tales that bring us to the nexus of fear and faith, reuniting us with popular ideas whose threads have run through Western civilization for millennia." (Kunin is expected to be at the show from Dec. 4-9.) See examples of her work at: http://www.contemporaryworks.net/artists/artist_imgs.php/1/6782 .

-- Marcus Doyle is presently working and living in London, although he spent several years photographing based out of Los Angeles. His images, which are shot during the twilight or evening hours, exhibit highly saturated colors and a formalism that hints of surrealism. Doyle has had several one-man shows, including "Isolation London" and "Dumped London", and his work has recently been featured at the AIPAD NY Photography Show, Art Chicago, Paris Photo, Photo London, Photo LA, Photo San Francisco and Photo New York. A book of his color work entitled "Marcus Doyle: Night Vision: Intimacies of an Unblinking Eye" was published in late 2005. Focus magazine (USA) and Fotografi (Norway) have both run major articles on Doyle's color photographs. In addition, Harper's magazine's May 2006 issue had a photograph by Doyle in its "Reader's Section", which is devoted to up-and-coming artists and authors. One of his newest works, the ghostly "Solway Firth Lifeboat Ramp, Scotland" will be on display for the first time, along with many of his other popular night-time images. See examples of his work at: http://www.contemporaryworks.net/artists/artist_imgs.php/1/3727 .

--Mitch Dobrowner has won numerous awards over the last few years for his unworldly black and white landscapes, including the latest two, a first prize in the Nature category for his B&W photo entry, "Rainstorm" from the French Prix de la Photographie Paris (Px3) Competition and the 2007 Lucie Awards' Best Amateur Nature Photographer. His work has also been recently featured in Black & White magazine and in a cover article in Lenswork. The artist describes his subject and his response to it this way: "The Earth is an ever changing eco-system. It's existed well before we were here and will hopefully be here well beyond the time we leave it. It's real, at times beautifully surreal, powerfully haunting and alive, all at the same time." Several of his new 30 x 40 inch prints will be on display. See examples of his work at: http://www.contemporaryworks.net/artists/artist_imgs.php/1/6597 .

-- Vladimír Birgus is considered to be one of the top Czech scholars and writers on Czech photography, as well as a talented contemporary photographer. He has written dozens of books and had his photographs published many times, including in two monographs, "Vladimír Birgus: Cosi nevyslovitelného--Something Unspeakable" and "Vladimír Birgus: Fotografie 1981-2004/Photographs 1981-2004". His color photography uses strong color to convey mystery and a quixotic sense of life. He has photographed all over the world, including Asia, North America, Central America and Europe. As Elzbieta Lubowicz notes in her introduction (to his monograph), Birgus uses large areas of dominant color--often primaries, and often red or yellow--to create an "unrealistic atmosphere [that reminds] us of abstract paintings more than of reality recordings." And yet his images are always in touch with the grit and texture of the modern, urban world. The human figures in his geometrically flattened landscapes of intersecting planes, shadows and sun-struck color are recognizably self-absorbed, often standing or walking in relation to one another, but without narrative or emotional connection. His photographs are in the collections of many institutions, including the Museum Ludwig (Cologne), Maison Européenne de la Photographie, the Bibliothéque National (Paris), the Museet for Fotokunst, the International Center of Photography (New York) and the Yokohama Museum of Art. See examples of his work at: http://www.contemporaryworks.net/artists/artist_imgs.php/1/6533 .

--Michael Philip Manheim's multi-exposure nude dance work has been exhibited throughout the United States and in Germany, Greece and Italy. His work has been featured in magazines such as Zoom (U.S. and Italy), Photographers International (Taiwan), La Fotografia (Spain), Black and White magazine, and numerous other publications. He has been Artist in Residence at Bates College in Lewiston, Maine and Phillips Exeter Academy in Exeter, New Hampshire. Intrigued with the themes of change and transformation, Manheim developed a signature style of layering phases of movement onto a single frame of film. This approach transcends a literal interpretation. He calls this series the "Rhythm from Within". Manheim's photographs are held in public and private collections, including the Library of Congress, the International Photography Hall of Frame & Museum, the Danforth Museum of Art and the Bates College Museum of Art. He has had over 15 solo exhibitions, including a current exhibit from September 27-October 27, 2007 at Safe-T-Gallery, 111 Front Street, Suite 214 in the DUMBO section of Brooklyn, NY. Julian Cox, curator of photography at Atlanta's High Museum of Art, noted that Manheim's photographs "have passion and beauty, and clearly considerable skill has gone into their execution." See examples of his work at: http://www.contemporaryworks.net/artists/artist_imgs.php/1/6520 .

--Joel D. Levinson has had two books to date, including "Fleamarkets" and "Joel D. Levinson, Photographs". A third book, "After Eden", is currently in the works. There have been more than 50 magazine and international print articles featuring his work, including Aperture, Art, Artforum, Artfactum, Arts, Artweek, High Performance, Horizon, Interview, New Art International, People, Picture and Zoom. Besides these two books, Levinson is also listed in Witkin and London's The Photograph Collector, the Macmillan Biographical Encyclopedia of Photographic Artists & Innovators; and Of People and Places: The Floyd and Josephine Segel Collection of Photography. He has been included in every edition of Who's Who in American Art since 1984. He is also in the Auer & Auer and the George Eastman House databases of photographers. Levinson has had more than 31 one-man shows, including shows at the Center for Creative Photography-Tucson, the O.K. Harris Gallery, the Lamagna Gallery, the Mateyka Gallery, the Milwaukee Art Museum, the Art Museum of South Texas, the Louisville J.B. Speed Art Museum, the Midwest Museum of American Art, the Crocker Art Museum, the Runter Museum of Art, the Davidson Art Center (Wesleyan University), the America Haus-Berlin, the Sprengel Art Museum and the Wilhelm Hack Art Museum. His large color photographs from his "After Eden" series on the English Gardens in Munich, Germany--a park known for its casual public clothing optional policy--will be exhibited in Miami at Contemporary Works' booth at the AIPAD Photography Show. See examples of his work at: http://www.contemporaryworks.net/artists/artist_imgs.php/1/3708 .

One of our other artists, Stanko Abadzic, will have a one-man show at the Galerie Zur Stockeregg booth at AIPAD. Galerie Zur Stockeregg represents Abadzic in Europe and will sell his work exclusively at the show. Make sure you stop by their booth. See examples of his work at: http://www.contemporaryworks.net/artists/artist_imgs.php/1/4783 .

 

During the last month well over 200 new photographs and nearly 100 photo books have been added to the I Photo Central website, including many classics. Plus, numerous Special Exhibits have also been added. To see everything that has been added, click here: http://www.iphotocentral.com/search/result_list.php/16/30/0 .

Some of the 19th-century works include an important set of 100 Eadweard Muybridge collotypes (one of the most complete groups to ever be offered on the market since they were originally released), important paper and daguerreian stereos, important tintypes and ambrotypes (including a full-plate tin of a grocery store in what looks like a Western town and an ambro of a Japanese soldier/aesthete with book and wine glass and decanters), daguerreotypes (including a Southworth & Hawes portrait of Dr. James Jackson), and albumen and platinum prints by anonymous and well-known photographers, including Baldus, Shaw, Bracklow, Beato and Kimbei. To see all the 19th-century work added recently in the last month, just click http://www.iphotocentral.com/search/result_list.php/17/0/1840/1899/30/0 .

Twentieth-century works include: an important surrealist image by Raoul Ubac, early nudes by Drtikol, modernist Japanese images, and important work from Doisneau, Halsmann, Cartier-Bresson, Atget, Kertesz and Karsh. To see all the 20th-century work added recently in the last month, just click: http://www.iphotocentral.com/search/result_list.php/17/0/1900/1989/30/0 .

New contemporary works by Michael A. Smith, Arthur Tress, Vladimir Birgus, Mitch Dobrowner, Claudia Kunin and Stanko Abadzic have been added to the I Photo Central website and their respective Special Exhibits. To see this new work that was just added to the websites, click here: http://www.iphotocentral.com/search/result_list.php/21/0/2000/2009/BBB/30/0 .

Several new Special Exhibits have also been added to the website.

Michael A. Smith has been working in photography since 1966. His photographic journeys during the past 36 years have taken him to every state in the continental United States, western Canada, and Europe. The results of these remarkable odysseys are included in the permanent collections of over 100 museums in the United States, Europe and Asia, including the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Museum of Modern Art in New York, the Art Institute of Chicago, the Bibliothèque Nationale, the Stedelijk Museum, and the Victoria and Albert Museum.

His commitment to the medium has resulted in over 200 exhibitions. In addition, he has twice received fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts, and he has been the recipient of major commissions to photograph four American cities. In 1981, Smith's first book, the two-volume monograph, "Landscapes 1975–1979", was awarded Le Grand Prix du Livre at the Rencontres Internationale de la Photographie in Arles, France. In 1992, Smith was honored with a 25-year retrospective exhibition at the International Museum of Photography at the Eastman House in Rochester, NY. To mark the occasion, "Michael A Smith: A Visual Journey--Photographs from Twenty-Five Years" was published.

His latest work, which was photographed earlier this year, is a series of powerful portrait studies of inmates who have been charged with violent crimes made at Sheriff Joe's Maricopa County 4th Avenue Jail in Phoenix, AZ. Smith subsequently interviewed them as well. Sheriff Joe has the deserved reputation for being the toughest sheriff in America. In his jails the inmates are not allowed to have cigarettes or coffee. There are no "adult" magazines. According to Smith, these photographs were all made with an 8x10-inch view camera. "Each of the 98 inmates I photographed volunteered to have his portrait made. My goal when making these photographs was not to show the inmates looking strange or "criminal"; neither was it my intention to romanticize them. I wanted to show them in a straightforward manner, as directly and as honestly as I could. Although the area where the inmates could stand was circumscribed, I asked them to stand however they felt relaxed and comfortable. There was no further direction."

You can see this Special Exhibit and read more of Michael Smith's biography and interesting comments about this work and his subjects by clicking here:
http://www.iphotocentral.com/showcase/showcase_view.php/157/1/1 .

Arthur Tress has been producing important, cutting edge work since his staged street photography in the 1960s-70s. While there is already an exhibit up on this work, we have added another Special Exhibit on a new facet of his creativity: his large-scale color work based on now destroyed installations that he created in New York City and Paris. This installation work--most of which Tress himself pulled together and spray painted in an abandoned hospital on New York's Welfare Island--is a largely unknown facet of this artist's extensive career, because the hospital was torn down without the work being shown to the public. The photographs are the only documentation of these stunning compositions and are prime examples of some of the cross-fertilization of different art forms/media that has taken place over the last few decades.

You can see this Special Exhibit by clicking here: http://www.iphotocentral.com/showcase/showcase_view.php/155/1/0/0 .

Modernist New York photographer Walfred Moisio has recently been getting attention and we are pleased to announce that we are the exclusive representative of the estate's vintage prints and we can also offer the limited edition prints that the estate is printing on two sizes of silver gelatin paper (11 x 14 and 16 x 20 inches).

In the midst of the Great Depression, Mosio put himself through Columbia University (1928-1933), where he earned a BA in Fine Arts. After graduating in 1933, Moisio joined the Emergency Relief Bureau, Home Relief Division. Later in 1935 he moved to 373 Bleecker Street and taught photography for the WPA Federal Arts Project. In 1940 he coordinated an exhibition of his students' work at the New York Metropolitan Museum of Art. Beginning in 1942 Moisio also began to freelance, photographing for the New Yorker, Esquire, Time, Look, Harpers' Bazaar, Vogue and the New York Times. While contemporaries such as Berenice Abbott, who also worked for the WPA, and Walker Evans may have influenced his work, he had his own take on this tumultuous era, capturing a wholly original point of view of New York and its street life. One image, "St. Mark's in the Bowery Church Graveyard", has more than a striking semblance to Evans' famed "Saratoga Springs" photograph.

Many of his images show viewpoints from high vantage points and extreme angles, much like Russian constructivist photography of the same period. Moisio's creative take on New York City was no doubt influenced by his art background and also from living with his wife Shari Frisch de Misky, a promising abstract painter with Russian roots, who was also a book designer and illustrator. It probably didn't hurt that they were living in the midst of the important Greenwich Village art scene of the 1940s and '50s.

Patricia Garcia Gomez, writing for the online magazine ZooZoom, described Moisio this way: "Moisio's ability to depict the essence of time and place within his honest and documentary style of photography is captivating. In this way he explored the social issues of the time. However, whilst you see casual traces of racial integration, sexuality and economic status, you do not feel he is politicizing his photographs. What you feel in looking at his New York is an optimism of spirit and gesture that feels both timelessly enduring and long ago lost in the City we experience today."

You can see this Special Exhibit and read more about this New York modernist by clicking here:
http://www.iphotocentral.com/showcase/showcase_view.php/159/1/0/0 .

If you have an interest in fashion images, you should definitely check out our two new Special Exhibits, Fashion Photography through the Ages, Part I and Part II. The higher level Part I can be found at:
http://www.iphotocentral.com/showcase/showcase_view.php/111/1/1 and the more modestly priced images in Part II, which are all under $500, at http://www.iphotocentral.com/showcase/showcase_view.php/156/1/0 .

Another new Special Exhibit is devoted to images relating to music which span both the 19th and 20th centuries. "Let There Be Music" can be found at: http://www.iphotocentral.com/showcase/showcase_view.php/158/1/0 .

Of course, lots of other new photographs have been added to the current Special Exhibits, so you should check them all out by going here: http://www.iphotocentral.com/showcase/showcase.php . There are not only photographs for sale, but also in-depth essays that accompany each Photo Exhibit.

 

I will be previewing the New York City auctions next Wednesday through Friday (October 10-12) and attending the auctions themselves the following week. If you wish me to preview any work for you, please call me at 1-215-822-5662 or email me at info@vintageworks.net by or before next Tuesday, October 9th. My mobile while I am in New York will be 1-215-518-6962.

My normal terms are 5% of the hammer price, which excludes the Buyer's premium. Please remember though when bidding that the Buyer's premium has been raised by Sotheby's and Christie's to 25% (from the previous 20%) on the first $25,000 and then 20% up to $500,000 (from the previous $200,000). Fortunately Swann has not raised its premiums.

My services include a condition report, consultation on pricing and evaluation of the item and, when necessary, bidding on it for you.

You need to notify the auction house, usually by fax, that I, through my company Vintage Works, Ltd., will be bidding for you.

 

Swann Auction Galleries' Monday, October 15th sale of Important 19th & 20th Century Photographs will be held at 2:30 p.m. at 104 East 25th St., New York City. The auction house has not raised its buyer's premium (currently 20%) as have other NYC auction houses.

A collection of 34 nautical photographs by prominent American and European photographers will be featured. The collection was built over the course of 25 years by marine photography enthusiast Charles W. Sahlman of Tampa, FL and has been exhibited at the Tampa Museum of Art.

A strong selection of 19th-century English photographers' works in the auction includes a salted paper print from a calotype negative by the inventor of photography, William Henry Fox Talbot. It is a very early (circa 1842-45) image of the "Hungerford Suspension Bridge", with several docked boats in the foreground (estimate: $15,000-25,000). Lewis Carroll's large format "Fair Rosamond" ($25,000-35,000) shows this noted photographer of children at his very best. This print was exhibited in San Francisco MoMA show's on Carroll and was published in the accompanying book, "Dreaming in Pictures". And Francis Frith's mammoth plate print of "The Temple of Komumboo" ($9,000-12,000) is another prime example of early British travel photography. Displaying the fallen and upright columns of this Egyptian temple, the image has a monumentality that is striking.

Other European photographers are also represented here, including Gustave LeGray's stunning "Brig on the Water", large-format albumen print, 1856 ($25,000-35,000), and two important Eugene Cuvelier photographs, including the unique and rich salt print of an 1862 image of a "Cart on the Road" ($20,000-30,000) and the circa 1860 albumen print of "Glade" ($6,000-9,000)--both incredible bargains against Cuvelier's Spring auction prices earlier this year.

American 19th-century landscape work also features strongly in this auction, including Timothy H. O'Sullivan's "Black Canyon, Colorado River from Camp 8, Looking Above", albumen print, 1871, from the Wheeler Geological Survey of the Western U.S. ($9,000-12,000); two mammoth plate albumen prints by Carleton Watkins--"The Devil's Canyon Geysers" ($20,000-30,000) and "Golden Gate Entrance to Harbor of San Francisco" ($15,000-25,000); a spectacular and perhaps unique panoramic view of a train heading east on the newly reconstructed Rockville Bridge in Pennsylvania by Philadelphia photographer Frederick Gutekunst ($15,000-25,000); and Frederick I. Monsen's sweeping vision of the "Laguna Indian Pueblo, New Mexico" in a brown-toned silver print from the 1890s (($2,500-3,500).

Also featured are Civil War photographers, including George N. Barnard's "Savannah, Georgia No. 2", gold-toned albumen print, 1866, from his photographic documentation of Sherman's Campaign ($2,500-3,500); and a rich, virtually perfect print of " Mortar Dictator, Front of Peterburg, October 1864" by David Knox and from Gardner's Photographic Sketchbook of the Civil War, pl.75 ($2,500-3,500).

Other turn-of-the-century work includes the lyrical English photographer Peter Henry Emerson's "Marshman Going to Cut Schoof-Stuff", platinum print, circa 1885, from his masterwork "Life and Landscape on the Norfolk Broads", ($4,000-6,000); and the renowned Antarctic photographer Herbert G. Ponting's majestic view of "The Terra Nova Icebound in the Pack", oversize green-toned carbon print, 1914, taken during Admiral Scott's ill-fated expedition ($15,000-25,000).

From the early 20th century are Karl F. Struss's "Sailboats, New England", platinum print, 1910 ($4,000-6,000); Alfred Steiglitz's classic image "The Steerage" that appeared in his publication Camera Work, photogravure on Japan tissue, 1911 ($5,000-7,500); a group of seven panoramic and large-scale albumen and platinum prints of New York City ($6,000-9,000) ; and Eugene Atget's "La Rochelle-Bateau", arrowroot print, circa 1920 ($7,000-10,000).

Modernist examples include master photographer Edward Weston's abstraction depicting the bow of a "Boat in San Francisco Bay", silver print, 1925 ($25,000-35,000); German artist Ernst Scheel's New Objectivity view of "Schiffmaste" from below, oversize silver print, circa 1930 ($10,000-15,000); Margaret Bourke-White's powerful scene of a sailor "Climbing the Mast", warm-toned silver print, 1934 ($9,000-12,000); and Manuel Alvarez Bravo's 1938 Untitled (Window in Wall), a silver print which came from the Andre Breton estate but was not in the auction ($20,000-30,000).

Other striking modernist views include Brassaï's "Regatte sur la Seine", ferrotyped silver print, 1933, printed 1940 ($5,000-7,500); Marta Hoeppfner's 1935 original and unique photographic collage "Sudden Fright" ($3,000-4,000); Brett Weston's 1946 silver print of "Manhattan Bridge" ($4,000-6,000); and Robert Frank's 1956 silver print of "Miami Beach" ($30,000-40,000).

Among journalistic images are Berenice Abbott's "Tusitala, North River and 156th St., Manhattan", silver print, 1937 ($4,000-6,000); and Andreas Feininger's "Brooklyn Bridge and Fulton Fish Market", and "New York, Fulton Fish Market", ferrotyped silver prints, 1940 ($3,000-4,500 each).

The auction also features several important albums, portfolios and books, including Edward S. Curtis' magnus opus, "The North American Indian", with 16 complete portfolios containing his large-format magisterial photogravures and 16 fully illustrated text volumes in handsome morocco bindings ($800,000-1,200,000). Besides the Curtis portfolio, other notable portfolios include Doris Ulmann's "Roll, Jordan, Roll", which was issued with an extra signed photogravure ($25,000-35,000), and a spectacular presentation album of 100 11 x 9-inch cyanotypes of the 1900 Paris Exposition attributed to Albert Levy ($10,000-15,000).

The preview will be held from 10/8, Monday, by appointment; from Tuesday, 10/9 to Friday, 10/12 from 10 a.m.-6 p.m.; Saturday, 10/13 from 10 a.m.-4 p.m.; Monday, 10/15 from 10 a.m.-noon. The actual auction hours are on Monday, 10/15 beginning at 2:30 p.m.

Swann Auction Galleries is at 104 East 25th St., New York, NY, 10010; phone: 1-212-254-4710, ext. 21; email: dkaplan@swanngalleries.com . You can order the illustrated catalogue for $35 from Swann, or view it online at http://www.swanngalleries.com .

 

On November 28th, more than 400 works of historic, classic and modern photography will be auctioned at Van Ham Fine Art Auctions in Cologne, Germany.

Original prints by internationally well known photographers such as Richard Avedon, Margaret Bourke-White, Albert Renger-Patzsch and August Sander will be offered, as well as contemporary photography by Lee Friedlander, Günther Förg, Thomas Ruff, Beat Streuli, Hiroshi Sugimoto and many others. Van Ham will also present a selection of rare photographic literature, including a large group of early publications by Ed Ruscha.

The auction will be held on Wednesday, November 28th at 3 p.m. at Van Ham Fine Art Auctions, Schoenhauser Str. 10-16, 50968 Cologne, Germany, tel.: +49-(0)221-92-58-62-0 (from the U.S. dial 011 then the number without the zero in parentheses). The preview will be held from 11/21-11/27, M-F, 10 a.m.- pm; Sa, 10 a.m.-4 p.m.; Su, 11 a.m-4 p.m.

For further information, email, Markus Eisenbeis, Van Ham's expert at: vm.eisenbeis@van-ham.com or call him at +49 (0)221-92-58-62-13. The online catalogue of the auction will be up shortly at http://www.van-ham.com/en/ .

 

By Brian Appel

(Now through October 20th at Deborah Bell, 511 W 25th St, Room 703, New York City; phone: 1-212-691-3883.)

In our consumer age of ironic distance where the viewer suspects both the reality of the photograph and the intentions of the photographer, Garry Winogrand is a breath of fresh air. Armed with a wide-angle lens and the highly mobile Leica rangefinder camera, Winogrand's signature focus on gesture provides us with the authentically unguarded, psychological dimension of people 'caught' inside his frame. But to the observant viewer, a seductive game of inter-connectedness between and among the people who find themselves inside Winogrand's frame is wedded with a post-modernist's fascination with how the camera is ideally suited to merge photographic truth with the photographic lie.

Take for example "Norman Mailer's 50th Birthday, New York" from 1973 (a 16 x 20-inch black and white print, which became part of his 74-image inquiry, "Public Relations", p.71, Museum of Modern Art, of 1977), which can be found in the west alcove of the Deborah Bell gallery. In this image the highly mimetic ability of the camera documents the simple truth of human experience (Mailer caught in deep conversation with a very motivated female member of his audience) caught in the context of one of the infatuations of post-modern thinking--the exploration of our increasing dependence on the media surrounding an important public event.

Due to the democratizing burst of light from his flash, a microphone and light fixture attached to the table top of the podium receive the same attention as Mailer and the object of his intense attention. An anonymous balding man is crushed by the crowd and is straining to hear what the woman who holds Mailer's attention is saying in the nutty carnival of the media event. As a consequence, the right side of this man's head holds equal weight in terms of composition as the 'main event' in the picture. Between those two important compositional elements is the motivated female audience member's hand held spread apart and doubled because of its reflection on the podium's polished surface in a four-finger salute that is roughly analogous to her "flipping the bird" at the writer. Judging by Mailer's complete concentration on the woman's focused and expressive gestures we have no doubt that their exchange is one of respectful import. The scene's composition, however, and the exact point along the time line that Winogrand chose to release the shutter suggests something much more light-hearted.

Another man, just off to the writer's right forearm (only his intense gaze and the top of his head are available) glares at the woman addressing Mailer. Is he the writer's publicist, security or another audience member impatiently waiting his turn to address Mailer? The foreshortening created by the lens, the flash and the position of the camera makes it seem as if Mailer is sniffing the top of the staring man's head. The aforementioned balding man in the picture whose face we cannot see also functions as an indicator of the time frame--the wide patchwork collar protruding over the lapel of his sport coat and the longish cut of what's left of his hair nails it as an early 1970s exposure.

When we see animals on film, we understand that they do not occupy the same space as humans. Although animals can be trained, we understand that there is less consent on their part when performing for the camera. Violence, or the potential for violence, has become the very emblem of the 'real' in film. In "New York", circa 1962, from the series off 44 images published originally in paperback by the New York Museum of Modern Art ("The Animals", p.13, 1969) and located on Bell's east wall, Winogrand uses what many of us inherently know about animal behavior to draw conclusions about the intensions of a young man who is talking to an attractive young girl at the zoo.

A white wolf is seen slowly creeping up to the couple who are leaning against a railing with their backs to the cage oblivious to the presence of the predator. The wide angle lens of Winogrand's camera captures perfectly the unmistakably stalking gestures of the wolf as he creeps up on the couple. The intense stare of the boy, whose face is split in two by a shadow cast from an off-camera tree, matches perfectly with the hidden right eye of the wolf cut off by the bars of the cage. The facial and body language of man and beast are unmistakable--both are stalking the girl. But how much of our leap to judgment about the intentions of this boy is set up by Winogrand's clever placement of the camera where the inter-connectiveness between people and their environments created this psychological assumption?

Winogrand's own search for truth in the 41 photographs on display in Bell's beautiful Chelsea gallery space would seem to be fundamentally linked to the artist's search for the aesthetic pleasure brought about by his fascination with uncovering beauty and transcendence that accompanies the unanticipated distortions and juxtapositions that occur with using a wide angle lens and placing himself in the heat of an unfolding publicly mediated event. In a way, Winogrand's images are successful because he merges photography's inherent ability to 'record reality' with the notion that what we 'see' is based on culturally negotiated conditions. Photography, as seen through the able eyes of this giant of the 20th century is an instrument that is best seen as schizophrenic--addressing the contested question of photography's truthfulness. Gallery owner Deborah Bell has given us a rare opportunity to explore a vital link between the modern and the postmodern. The heart of this show has implications far beyond photography.

(Editor's note: while we do not usually do gallery show reviews, we did feel that this was a particular significant show. We will consider reviewing other such shows when location and space permits.)

(Brian Appel is a contributing writer for both iphotocentral.com and artcritical.com, focusing on photography and contemporary art. He has a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Photography from the University of Manitoba's School of Art and a Masters of Arts (Photography and Film Studies) from the University of Iowa. He has been intrigued by the concept of photographer as witness since walking into the first posthumous New York Museum of Modern Art exhibition of Diane Arbus in 1972. He has written several articles for the E-Photo Newsletter and the I Photo Central website on contemporary art photography.)

 

By Matt Damsker

PIECES OF CHINA.
Photographs by Michael Wolf. Text by Minna Valjakka. 2007, Vapriikki Publishers, Tampere, Finland. 92 pages; approximately 100 color plates; ISBN No. 978-951-609-322-5. For more information: http://www.tampere.fi/vapriikki .

This fine catalogue is keyed to a retrospective of photographer Michael Wolf's work in China--an ongoing project begun in 1994, when he began living there--which continues through January 6, 2008, at Finland's Tampere Museums. It seems an especially timely body of work now that China's rampant economic growth has focused the world on everything from its environmental pollution problems to manufacturing lapses that have resulted in the discovery of lead paint and other dangers in its exported toys.

Indeed, Wolf's China photographs include a portfolio of remarkable China toy images that suit his saturated color technique, with stunning montages that depict the drudgery of mass toy production and exhausted factory workers amidst a multi-color ocean of innumerable plastic toys. As Minna Valjakka's text points out, mainland China is the world's biggest toy exporter by a wide margin, but the retail price of one high-quality toy in the western market is often more than six months' salary for a Chinese toy factory worker.

Thus, Wolf's vision (he was born in Munich, Germany and studied at the University of California in Berkeley and with Otto Steinert at the University of Essen) yields a sociological study of a vast culture that is at once in and out of balance with the rest of the modern world. Wolf captures images of China's youth in trendy Western dress, or its elderly in Maoist peasant garb, all in an urban context that ranges from the bleak, hardscrabble landscapes of old neighborhoods to the futuristic backdrops of cities like Shanghai.

The textures of Chinese life are made vivid in his rich color work, and the formality of his approach--mostly full-frontal portraits of his subjects in their milieu--projects a strong sense of personality and place. But Wolf also courts the repetitive abstraction of China's massive apartment building facades, and brings a rich pop irony to a series of photographs of China's many art copyists, who create decent reproductions of canonical Western artworks--by the likes of Roy Lichtenstein, Andy Warhol, and Gerhard Richter--and who pose for Wolf with their handiwork in the forlorn streets. This unique exhibition also features a great collection of Chinese propaganda posters from the Mao era, and their candy colors and utopian sentimentality complement the high-keyed hues of Wolf's realism.


BRIEFLY NOTED: Those with a passion for photography's history will want to read Fred Bremner's "My Forty Years in India," originally a privately published memoir for family and friends by an important 19th-century photographer. Bremner was born in Scotland and went to India in 1882, establishing his own studio and documenting the cultural highs and lows of the subcontinent during the heyday of the British Raj. Pagoda Tree Press has reprinted Bremner's chatty little book (70 pages, in paperback) for the first time, and it's a charming mixture of everyday observation and acknowledgement of India's vast majesty (for information: http://www.pagodatreepress.com , or email Hugh Raynor at hughrayner@pagaodapress.com ).

Then there's a sprawling compilation of writings about photography by the medium's biggest 20th-century names--from Berenice Abbott to Cartier-Bresson, Lee Friedlander, John Szarkowski, Garry Winogrand and virtually every important personage in between--and yet "The Education of a Photographer" (co-published by the School of Visual Arts and Allworth Press; paperback, $19.95, http://www.allworth.com ) is something of a hodge-podge of previously published bits and pieces, interviews and maxims that fails to chart a coherent course. Co-editors Charles H. Traub, Adam B. Bell, and Steven Heller are well-credentialed New York-based artists and academics, but this collection is only suited for casual spot-reading or as curriculum fodder. And the absence of an excerpt from Susan Sontag's seminal essay, "On Photography"--arguably the most important intellectual deconstruction of the medium--is a glaring omission (though Sontag is briefly cited a few times).


Matt Damsker is an author and critic, who has written about photography and the arts for the Los Angeles Times, Hartford Courant, Philadelphia Bulletin, Rolling Stone magazine and other publications. His book, "Rock Voices", was published in 1981 by St. Martin's Press. His essay in the book, "Marcus Doyle: Night Vision" was published this past November.

(Book publishers, authors and photography galleries/dealers may send review copies to us at: I Photo Central, 258 Inverness Circle, Chalfont, PA 18914. We do not guarantee that we will review all books or catalogues that we receive.)

 

IN-SIGHT PHOTOGRAPHY PROJECT'S 9TH ANNUAL AUCTION

The In-Sight Photography Project's Ninth Annual Silent Auction & Exhibit features prints from Danny Lyon, Susan Meisalas, Clemens Kalischer, Wendy Ewald, John Willis, Laura McPhee, Rebecca Lepkoff, Mark Shaw and more than 150 prints by photographers from all regions of the U.S.

The auction supports the mission of In-Sight Photography: providing a creative outlet to youth in Windham County by offering photography classes to students regardless of their ability to pay.

Prints are available for on-line viewing and bidding at http://www.insight-photography.org and will be exhibited in the Vermont Center for Photography, 49 Flat Street, Brattleboro, VT 05301. Their website is http://www.vcphoto.org .

An opening reception will be held this Friday, October 5, 5:30-8:30 p.m. Gallery Hours are Monday-Friday 1-6 p.m.; weekends noon-5 p.m. A closing reception will be held Sunday, October 28, 3:30-5:30 p.m. Contact the Vermont Center for Photography, 49 Flat Street, Brattleboro, VT, 05301 (at the steps to Eliot Street by the new Flat Street Parking garage). For directions or information, please contact the gallery at 1-802-251-6051 or 1-802-251-9960 or vcphoto@sover.net .


PHOTO REVIEW'S NYC PREVIEW AND AUCTION

You are invited to the New York preview of The Photo Review's annual benefit auction from October 18-20 at the Yossi Milo Gallery North, 531 W. 25th St., New York, NY 10011. Gallery hours are 10 a.m.-6 p.m.

Visitors will be able to purchase images by taking advantage of the "End This Auction" feature (by bidding the high estimate).

The auction itself will be held on Saturday, November 10, 2007 at 7 p.m. in the Dorrance-Hamilton Building at the University of the Arts in Philadelphia.

The event will feature work by an international slate of historic and contemporary photographers. Beginning and experienced collectors alike will have the opportunity to bid on work by such historic masters as Eugène Atget, Felice Beato, Edouard Boubat, Edward S. Curtis, Robert Doisneau, Maxime Du Camp, Harold Edgerton, Lewis Hine, Gertrude Käsebier, Russell Lee, Gordon Parks, Herb Ritts, Edward Steichen, Karl Struss, Josef Sudek, Maurice Tabard and Clarence White. Among the contemporary photo stars whose work will go on the block are Marilyn Bridges, Lucien Clergue, Raymond Depardon, Lois Greenfield, Dave Heath, Chip Hooper, Henry Horenstein, Michael Kenna, Robert Glenn Ketchum, Mark Klett, Susan Meiselas, Jeffrey Milstein, Joe Mills, Duane Michals, Frank Rodick, Rosalind Solomon, Jack Spencer, Catherine Steinmann, Joyce Tenneson, George Tice, and Philip Trager, while featured Philadelphia-area luminaries include Susan Fenton, Judy Gelles, David Graham, Larry Fink, and Ray K. Metzker. According to Photo Review editor Stephen Perloff, prices should range from $50 to $6,000.

A silent auction, concurrent with the live auction, will feature photography and computer equipment and software, film and paper, restaurant meals, museum memberships, theater tickets, books, etc.

A preview will be held at the Dorrance-Hamilton Building on Friday, November 9 from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. and on Saturday, November 10 from 11 a.m. to 6 p.m., just prior to the auction.

Proceeds from the auction, a popular event since 1983, fund such activities as an annual juried competition for emerging photographers. Admission is free with purchase of the fully illustrated catalog, available through the Photo Review, 1-215-891-0214. Buyers may preview the auction on-line, and place bids at http://www.photoreview.org . The auction lots will be online in about a week.

 

For the second year, Aperture and AIPAD (Association of International Photography Art Dealers) are presenting "The Passionate Eye", a special day of conversations dedicated to collecting photography. The first three sessions feature collectors in dialogue with an esteemed artist, curator or writer, followed by a special advice session with appraisers.

This program offers a unique opportunity for both new and experienced collectors to hear expert opinions about current trends in collecting, what constitutes a great collection, and where the industry is headed from some of the most knowledgeable people in the field of photography today.

The event will be held on Sunday, October 14th, from 9:30 a.m.-3 p.m. at the Aperture Gallery, 547 West 27th Street, 4th floor, New York City. The gallery phone number is 1-212-505-5555, but this is not for registration. The cost of the program is only $100 and includes refreshments and lunch. You can register online at http://www.aperture.org/collector or call 1-212-946-7125. Space is limited to 75 people, so register soon.

 

Artcurial's auction expert Gregory Leroy let me know that French photographer Janine Niépce had passed away on August 5, 2007.

Leroy told me, "Nearly everybody was out of Paris at the time. I was in some Amazonian jungle and got the news ten days later, and because of the timing, there was not so much fuss about it. A pity. I saw her just a couple of weeks before she died. She looked great, and surprisingly fit. She got me drunk (not such an achievement, I know) with the beautiful white wine her family produced in Burgundy…We certainly miss her. You can say she was a real humanist. Not a feminist, as she liked to claim, but an artist with a genuine empathy for people of all ages or origin."

Janine Niépce was born on February 12, 1921 in Meudon, outside Paris, to a family involved in the Burgundy wine trade. Her family is linked to the inventor of photography, Nicephore Niépce. She studied art and archaeology at the Sorbonne.

In 1955 she took Henri Cartier-Bresson's advice and joined the photo agency Rapho. She was given the Chevalier for Arts and Letters in 1981 and the French Legion of Honor in 1985. Over 20 books were published on her photographic work.

Niepce's work often focused on the history and struggles of women worldwide. Until she died, she was considered one of France's top living female photographers.