 Andrè Kertèsz: Paul Arma's Hands, 1928 Gelatin silver print, 6 3/8 x 6 3/8 inches Andrè Kertèsz and the Paris Avant-Garde Edwynn Houk Gallery is pleased to present an important selection of vintage photographs by Andrè Kertèsz and his contemporaries, to coincide with the Kertèsz retrospective at the National Gallery in Washington, D.C. The exhibition consists of ten major works by Kertèsz, including "Chez Mondrian", 1926 and "Mondrian’s Glasses and Pipe", 1926; photograms, solarizations and nudes by Man Ray; rare vintage prints by Henri Cartier-Bresson; and works from the personal collection of Brassaï. With the inclusion of photographs by contemporaries such as Dora Maar, Andre Breton, Germaine Krull, and the wife of Kertèsz, Rogi Andre, the exhibition conveys the provocative and progressive photographic experimentation taking place in early 20th century Paris. Andrè Kertèsz (American, b. Hungary, 1894-1985) is considered by many to be the single greatest photographer of the 20th century. Kertèsz began his photographic career in his native Hungary, but it was during the eleven years in Paris, between the two World Wars, that the artist cultivated the experimental innovations and foundations of his oeuvre. A pioneer of Formalism, Surrealism, and the lyrical street photograph, Kertèsz was a member of a celebrated milieu that included Piet Mondrian, Fernand Leger and Tristan Tzara. Thanks to his progressive vision and evinced by his influence on artists such as Man Ray, Brassai, Laszlo Moholy-Nagy and Henri Cartier-Bresson, Kertèsz established himself as one of Europe’s leading photographers of the 1920s and 1930s. Within the first decades of the 20th Century, Paris became the art capital of the world, attracting artists, writers and poets from Hungary, Germany, England and the United States. The hub of a burgeoning art mecca, and the birthplace of photography, Paris provided an environment conducive to cultivating, expressing and experimenting with wild forms of creative energy. The years between the two World Wars proved particularly fertile for the arts. Kertèsz and his contemporaries thrived off one another, each on the brink of discovery and even greater creativity. Taking full advantage of all that modern urban life presented by capturing the fantastic nature inherent in daily experience, these artists worked in radically new ways. No single photographer embodies this legacy more completely than Andrè Kertèsz, as this exhibition seeks to illustrate. Exhibition: 21 April - 4 June 2005 Gallery hours: Tues-Sat 11am - 6pm Edwynn Houk Gallery 745 Fifth Avenue at 57th Street USA-New York, NY 10151 Telephone +1 212 750.7070 Fax +1 212 688.4848 Email info@houkgallery.com www.houkgallery.com |
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