Showing posts with label photography exhibition. Show all posts
Showing posts with label photography exhibition. Show all posts

Saturday, May 27, 2023

British photos show underclass stories of 1970s and 1980s


Martin Parr (b. 1952), Peter Frazier, New Brighton, Merseyside, 1984, chromogenic print, National Gallery of Art. This makes me particularly sad.  There's a crying baby begging for attention while his mother/caregiver sunbathes, needing a break, no doubt.  The clash of humans with different needs.  The baby won't stay a baby for long. Pick her up, Mother!

Karen Knorr, (b. 1954, Germany), Newspapers are no longer ironed, Coins no longer boiled So far have Standards Fallen., 1981–1983, printed 2015, gelatin silver print, National Gallery of Art. Knorr gained access to exclusive men's clubs to make photographs like this one which may be linked to a former lover of hers.


If you want to see what the rest of Britain looked like in the 1970s and 1980s, don't miss the photo exhibition at the National Gallery of Art before it closes June 11. 

By "rest of," I mean those who are not usually pictured or the "non-subjects," the working classes, those members of society living on the edge, some "hand to mouth," struggling just to get by.  

The exhibition is an eclectic mix, part bleak, part gloomy and dismal, but part inspirational. Life does have its moments of joy, even for these subjects, but those events are not worth the camera, are they?  

Colin Jones, 1936-2021, The Black House, London, 1973–1976, gelatin silver print, National Gallery of Art. Before he devoted himself to photography, Jones was a ballet dancer who died of Covid-19.


Chris Killip, (1946-2020),  Crabs and People, Skinningrove, North Yorkshire, UK, 1981, gelatin silver print, National Gallery of Art. For Killip's Seacoal series, he lived for more than a year in a trailer on the beach to gain the trust of his neighbors.  Do you think they minded being his subjects?

Kara Felt, the curator from the Denver Botanic Gardens but formerly at NGA, noted that the wall copy claims the photographers weren't trying to change the world, but simply "bearing witnesses." Their portraits made them aloof but willing participants.   

In mostly black and white, the pictures tell a story of Britain when Margaret Thatcher was prime minister, when the Beatles were singing "All We Need is Love!" (Of interest, many celebrated the prime minister's death last month on the tenth anniversary of her passing, April 8, 2013.) 

Not all the photographers were born in Britain, Ms. Felt said. She called the era "a period of rebellion" with labor unrest, high inflation and unemployment (not unlike today's world). Good night! It was another social revolution which the National Gallery of Art labeled a "revolution in British photography," too. 

Chris Steele-Perkins. (b. 1947, Myanmar), Hypnosis Demonstration, Cambridge University Ball, 1980–1989, silver dye bleach print, National Gallery of Art. The photographer moved to color after he recorded Ireland's "Troubles" in the 1980s. Upon seeing this when he was younger, my now-grown son would have said: "Mom!  This is ridicqulus!" 


Decades before self-publishing became more of the norm, some of the photographers in this show were self-publishers, like Paul Graham, whose A1: The Great North Road helped introduce color photography.

Some pictures satirize the upper classes, naturally, like one of a room of young partygoers experiencing hypnosis at a cocktail party and another one by of a disconcerted woman off to the side, ignored by others at an event.

Photos line the walls in two galleries plus an extension of the show screens in a small adjacent theatre, a 59-minute film, Handsworth Songs, 1986, produced by the Black Audio Film Collective whose Reece Auguiste was guest curator for the exhibition. The film is harsh and violent at times, illustrating true Afro-Asian experiences, past and present, with archival footage and a mix of reggae and post-punk music.(Handsworth is a section of Birmingham.)  

I've always found photo exhibitions rather depressing, perhaps because they are mostly black and white made by contemporary photographers, like artists, who focus on realism, the dystopian world, rather than anything remotely optimistic, with color and enthusiasm. 

Hidden here, however, under all the fortifications, I found a glimmer of hope that tomorrow will be a better day.

The Gallery's Diane Waggoner, curator of photography, helped organize the exhibition.

What: This is Britain:  Photographs from the 1970s and 1980s

When: Through June 11, 2023. The National Gallery hours are 10 a.m. - 5 p.m. daily.  Open Memorial Day.

Where: West Building, Ground Floor: G27, 28, 29, National Gallery of Art, 6th and Constitution, Washington

How much: Admission is always free at the National Gallery of Art.

Metro stations for the National Gallery of Art:
Smithsonian, Federal Triangle, Navy Memorial-Archives, or L'Enfant Plaza

For more information: (202) 737-4215

Accessibility information: (202) 842-6905

patricialesli@gmail.com




Saturday, August 13, 2022

Earth v. humans in photos at the National Gallery of Art


Robert Adams,  Kerstin next to an Old-Growth Stump, Coos County, Oregon, 1999 gelatin silver print, San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, Gift of Daniel Greenberg and Susan Steinhauser 

Thousands of persons can now see the haunting photographs of the American West taken by Robert Adams from 1965 to 2015 which are now on display in eight galleries at the National Gallery of Art.

Mr. Adams, now 85 and of no relation to Ansel Adams, is an American photographer whose reputation has risen over decades, now in sync with the impacts of climate change, its destruction and effects of humans on the Earth. 
Robert Adams, Clearcut, Clatsop County, Oregon, c. 2000 gelatin silver print, National Gallery of Art, Washington, Gift of Robert and Kerstin Adams 
Robert Adams, Newly Occupied Tract Houses, Colorado Springs, 1968 gelatin silver, private collection, San Francisco
Robert Adams, Pikes Peak Park, Colorado Springs (detail), 1969 gelatin silver print, Yale University Art Gallery, purchased with a gift from Saundra B. Lane, a grant from the Trellis Fund, and the Janet and Simeon Braguin Fund

With his wife, Kerstin, the photographer has chosen the National Gallery of Art for his current exhibition of 175 of his photos to afford opportunities to as many people as possible to see the pictures for free.

This according to National Gallery's curator, Sarah Greenough, who began working with the Adamses ten years ago on the show.
Robert Adams, North Denver Suburb, 1973, printed 1981 gelatin silver print, Philadelphia Museum of Art, Purchased with the Alice Newton Osborn Fund, 1982 


Robert Adams, Nebraska State Highway 2, Box Butte County, Nebraska, 1978, printed 1991 gelatin silver print, National Gallery of Art, Washington, The Ahmanson Foundation and Gift of Robert and Kerstin Adams 

In the exhibition, the pictures are segregated by themes: "the gift," "our response," and "tenancy."

In bleak settings of black and white horizontal landscapes void of most humans, Mr. Adams's pictures show the Earth's lands in all their stark nakedness, the blemishes uncovered, but herein lies truth and beauty which often evoke moonscapes and document a lack of gratitude for Earth's gifts, abandonment of the planet by its guests.

Robert Adams, Store, Elizabeth, Colorado, 1965, printed 1988 gelatin silver print, National Gallery of Art, Washington, Pepita Milmore Memorial Fund and Gift of Robert and Kerstin Adams.  Compare to Edward Hopper's Lonely House , 1922, below.
The catalog shows the print above by Edward Hopper, The Lonely House, 1922, Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; Josephine N. Hopper Bequest
Robert Adams, Schoolyard, Ramah, Colorado, 1968 gelatin silver print, private collection, San Francisco

Robert Adams, Colorado Springs, 1968, printed 1983, gelatin silver print, National Gallery of Art, Washington, Gift of Mary and Dan Solomon and Patrons' Permanent Fund.  Does this remind you of Edward Hopper?

Robert Adams, The River’s Edge, 2015, gelatin silver print,  National Gallery of Art, Washington, Gift of Stephen G. Stein.  Seven years ago this dry riverbed forecast today's drought-striken lands of the West.  The tree stub is similar to a human skeleton like  those found at Lake Mead near Las Vegas this year, after the water level dropped significantly, an effect of climate change.

Robert Adams, North Edge of Denver, 1973-1974, printed 2008, gelatin silver print, National Gallery of Art, Washington, Gift of Robert and Kerstin Adams. A sad and lonely industrial side of town on first glance, but then a viewer starts to think more about it, and...

For the large, 300+ paged catalogue, American Silence: The Photographs of Robert Adams ($65) which includes a complete timeline of Mr. Adams's life, Ms. Greenough has written a marvelous biographical essay about him


He was born in 1937 in New Jersey to liberal Methodist parents who moved to the West where the boy often went hiking with his dad, exploring the outdoors, rafting rivers, working in camps.

The son was a Boy Scout who attained the lofty Eagle Scout award. The outdoors became his paradise and later, the subject of his pictures.  

He loved reading and visiting the Denver Art Museum with his sister.  An architectural drawing course he took in high school influenced his life.

In college Mr. Adams met his wife who was a book worm like he and another lover of nature.
A fellowship enabled him to become Dr. Adams and earn a Ph.D. in English literature while he was teaching at Colorado College.
While there, he began taking pictures part time, giving up teaching in 1970 to devote himself full time to his passion: taking pictures of the outdoors.

The author of many books, one, The New West published in 1974 (and on display at the Gallery) helped launch his career. Later came a prayer book set in the forest, Prayers in an American Church. (Earlier in his life, Ms. Greenough said Adams considered becoming a Methodist pastor but decided organized religion was too confining.) 

Another of his memorable titles is Our Lives and Our Children (1984, with a new 2018 edition) which describes in pictures the people who lived at risk downwind from the Rocky Flats Nuclear Weapons Plant near Denver where the Adamses lived. 

Ms. Greenbough in her essay and Arthur Lubow who interviewed Mr. Adams for the New York Times (July 13, 2022) cite the influences on the photographer of Paul Cézanne and Edward Hopper and their emphases on melancholy and loneliness, easy to spot in many of Mr. Adams's pictures . 

Ms. Greenbough notes that Mr. Adams is also well versed in Emily Dickinson and Henry David Thoreau.

Some find hope in his pictures, but for others, hope is buried in the stark portrayals of the detritus left by humans.

But look, there on the horizon, hope comes with the passage of President Biden's climate justice bill and what can be. 

This is a large display of stimulating pictures to spark a conversation, as great art does, about what was, what is, and what we can do about it.

Thank you, Mr. and Mrs. Adams, the National Gallery of Art, Jeffrey Frankel, Terry Tempest, and many others. 

The show travels to the Nevada Museum of Art in Reno for exhibition Oct. 29, 2022 - Jan. 29, 2023. 

What: American Silence: The Photographs of Robert Adams

When: Now through Oct. 2, 2022, 10 a.m. to 5 p.m.

Where: West Building, Ground Floor, Galleries 23-29, National Gallery of Art, 6th and Constitution, Washington

How much: Admission is always free at the National Gallery of Art.

Metro stations for the National Gallery of Art:
Smithsonian, Federal Triangle, Navy Memorial-Archives, or L'Enfant Plaza

For more information: (202) 737-4215

Accessibility information: (202) 842-6905

patricialesli@gmail.com







Tuesday, June 21, 2022

Picture this! Princess Diana and the Royals at Tysons Corner!


At the Princess Diana:  Accredited Access Exhibition, Tysons Corner/Photo by Patricia Leslie
 Princess Diana: Accredited Access Exhibition by Anwar, Samir, and Zak
Hussein
 

Diana, about one month before William was born in 1982, at an Aston, a favorite car of Charles. Photo from Princess Diana:  Accredited Access Exhibition by Anwar, Samir, and Zak Hussein


Unless you've been hibernating in the English Channel for the last 40 years, you have likely seen most of the photographs (or ones very much like them) on display at the Princess Diana (1961-1997) exhibition at Tysons Corner Mall.

It requires a royal fee to get in and only hardcore, extreme Royal watchers need apply.

Adults can buy weekend tickets for $32; seniors, $24; children, $21; or a family pass, $84.  (Weekdays and groups are cheaper. Please see below.)

It takes about 30-45 minutes to walk through and look at blown-up pictures.

Some new pictures are found here and there, but are they worth the entrance fee? 

At the Princess Diana:  Accredited Access Exhibition, Tysons Corner/Photo by Patricia Leslie
Princess Diana:  Accredited Access Exhibition by Anwar, Samir, and Zak Hussein

At the Princess Diana:  Accredited Access Exhibition, Tysons Corner/Photo by Patricia Leslie
Princess Diana:  Accredited Access Exhibition by Anwar, Samir, and Zak Hussein
Hats in likenesses of those worn by British royalty are featured in one gallery at the Diana exhibition, this one created by Pauline Loctin, a "paper sculptor."/Photo by Patricia Leslie

At the Princess Diana:  Accredited Access Exhibition, Tysons Corner/Photo by Patricia Leslie
At the Princess Diana:  Accredited Access Exhibition, Tysons Corner/Photo by Patricia Leslie
Souvenirs available for purchase at the exit range from $5 for a postcard to $35 for a tote bag, $60 for a sweatshirt, a baseball hat ($40), t-shirt ($40), notebook ($30), and compact mirror ($15)/Photo by Patricia Leslie

At the Princess Diana:  Accredited Access Exhibition, Tysons Corner/Photo by Patricia Leslie

The title of the display is a misnomer since many of the photographs are not of Diana but other Royals, including the now "non-Royals," Harry and Meghan, some of my favorite people. 

The curator Clifton Skelliter explained to me that the pictures were taken over decades by a family of "official Royal photographers," Anwar Hussein, and his sons, Samir and Zak. Royal photographers are those who are "approved" by the Royals to take pictures of the Royal Family, pictures the photographers are then free to sell.

In 2016 Anwar Hussein became the longest serving "official" Royal photographer.

When Diana's dresses and gowns come to town, now that's another story. Do write, love, with all the details when they are known.

What: Princess Diana:  Accredited Access Exhibition

When: Through Sept. 8, 2022. Closed Mondays and Tuesdays. 

Where: Ground floor, Tysons Corner, across from H&M, near Barnes & Noble. 

How much: Prices range from $25 (weekdays) to $46 (weekends), adults; $20 to $35, seniors, military and students; $17 to $31, children; $68 to $84, family of 2 adults and 2 children; groups of 10 or more, less, all with audio guide and some with a souvenir program which sells at the show for $25.

Metro station: Tysons Corner 


Patricialesli@gmail.com



Friday, May 27, 2022

Harlem photographs close Monday at the National Gallery of Art


James Van Der Zee, Portrait of a Young Woman, 1930, gelatin silver print with applied color, National Gallery of Art, Washington, Pepita Milmore Memorial Fund © 1969 Van Der Zee



Portraits of Harlem residents in the refined elegance of the 1920s and 1930s and beyond are on view at the National Gallery of Art through Monday, May 30, 2022.

In a small gallery from the Gallery's collection of works by Black photographer, James Van Der Zee (1886-1983) hang about 40 of his pictures of landmark places and people dressed up for special occasions, many shot during the heyday of the Harlem Renaissance.
James Van Der Zee, Blumstein’s Sales Girls, 1930, gelatin silver print, Alfred H. Moses and Fern M. Schad Fund, 2021.33.3.  Above, the real ring the lady wears differs from the sparkly ring another lady wears which Mr. Van Der Zees added, according to a blog post by NGA's Laura Panadero.  Can you spot the differences?



Mr. Van Der Zee was born in Lenox, Massachusetts and received his first camera when he was 14, one of the first persons in Lenox to have the device which he used to take hundreds of photos of his family and others.

At age 20, he moved to New York City to join his father and brother in their work as elevator operators and waiters.

Mr. Van Der Zee's musical talents on the violin and piano led to his participation as one of five members of the Harlem Orchestra.
  
James Van Der Zee, Portrait of a Couple, 1924, gelatin silver print, National Gallery of Art, Washington, Robert B. Menschel Fund © 1969 Van Der Zee


He became a darkroom assistant which led to his stature at the most renowned photographer in Harlem, who "produced the most comprehensive documentation of the period" (Wikipedia) but his business declined in the 1930s due to economic conditions and increasing camera sales to the public.

It was not unusual for photographers to retouch their photos which Mr. Van Der Zee has done in several examples here, like adding a bracelet and ring to the woman pictured above in Portrait of a Young Woman. Writes the National Gallery's Laura Panadero in a blog post, Mr. Van Der Zee likely used graphite to enhance his pictures. 
James Van Der Zee, Marcus Garvey (right) with George O. Marke (left) and Prince Kojo Tovalou-Houénou, 1924, gelatin silver print, National Gallery of Art, Washington, Avalon Fund © 1969 Van Der Zee
James Van Der Zee, “Beautiful Bride,” c. 1930, gelatin silver print, National Gallery of Art, Washington, Alfred H. Moses and Fern M. Schad Fund © 1969 Van Der Zee
James Van Der Zee, Portrait of Sisters, 1926, gelatin silver print, National Gallery of Art, Washington, Robert B. Menschel Fund © 1969 Van Der Zee
James Van Der Zee, Couple, Harlem, 1932, printed 1974, gelatin silver print, National Gallery of Art, Washington, Alfred H. Moses and Fern M. Schad Fund © 1969 Van Der Zee




In 1967 Mr. Van Der Zee was "rediscovered" and featured in a controversial exhibition at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. He often photographed funerals (including his daughter's), resulting in the book, The Harlem Book of the Dead.

He died in Washington, D.C. in 1983.

What: James Van Der Zee's Photographs: A Portrait of Harlem

When: Now through May 30, 2022, 10 a.m. to 5 p.m.

Where: Ground floor of the West Building, National Gallery of Art, Washington

How much: Admission is always free at the National Gallery of Art.

Covid policy: Masks are not required but encouraged. Proof of vaccination is not required.

Metro stations for the National Gallery of Art:
Smithsonian, Federal Triangle, Navy Memorial-Archives, or L'Enfant Plaza

For more information: (202) 737-4215

Accessibility information: (202) 842-6905

patricialesli@gmail.com



Saturday, January 15, 2022

Women photographers 'shoot to kill' at the National Gallery of Art


Grete Stern (German-Argentine, 1904-1999), Sueño No. 1: "Articulos electricos para el hogar" (Dream No. 1: "Electrical Appliances for the Home"), 1949, The Metropolitan Museum of Art.  Does this remind you of the leg lamp in A Christmas Story? Total Wines sold out of the six-inch cocktail glass modeled after the leg lamp last Christmas. It and this photograph say to me: "Women are only objects, to turn off and on, at will. " What does it say to you?


It is hard to know where to begin to describe in a few words the outstanding picture show now at the National Gallery of Art which features works by 120 professional women photographers from around the globe spanning the 1920s to 1950s.

On these cold days, you can warm up fast with free admission (always) at the West Building and see what feminists from the last century were thinking.  They were more "advanced" and progressive than you might think.

One of my favorites photographs among the hundreds displayed is the "lamp lady" (above) made by Grete Stern, a Bauhaus student who emigrated to London in 1933 (or 1934, depending upon what you read) from Germany following the rise of Nazism. In London she stayed only two years before moving with her husband, Horacio Coppola, also a photographer, to his native Argentina. 

There, the couple's first show has been called "the first exhibition of modern photography in Argentina." Later, among her other achievements, Ms. Stern made 150 photomontages for a magazine column whose authors analyzed women's dreams. (I would like to see them!)

At the National Gallery of Art, October 26, 2021, framed by Tom's, 1974 by Alexander Calder (1898-1976), Calder Foundation/by Patricia Leslie
Ruth Orkin (American, 1921–1985), Ethel Waters, Carson McCullers, and Julie Harris at the Opening Night Party for "The Member of the Wedding," New York City, 1950, The Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Ruth Orkin, the photographer who took the picture above, is, for some reason, missing from the catalog. (Copyright issues?) Her biography says she received her first camera at age 10, and at age 17, Ms. Orkin took a bicycle trip across the U.S., shooting pictures as she went.

In New York, she photographed celebrities and worked for major magazines. During worldwide travels, she met art student, Nina Lee Craig and together they published, "Don't Be Afraid to Travel Alone," about women traveling after World War II.

Ms. Orkin made two films with her husband and filmmaker, Morris Engel; one, Little Fugitive, was nominated for an Academy Award in 1953.
Lucy Ashjian (American, 1907? 1909? –1993), Savoy Dancers, 1935–1943, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Gift of Gregor Ashjian Preston.

The daughter of Armenian refugees, Ms. Ashjian, born in Indianapolis, joined the Communist Party in the 1930s and later graduated from the Clarence H. White School of Photography in New York City in 1937.  She was an elected officer and editor for several photographers' groups and was one of 10 photographers who helped produce the Harlem Project. For years one of her photographs was erroneously attributed to Aaron Siskind, according to the catalog.

McCarthyism forced her resignation from the Communist Party around 1949.
Hansel Mieth (German, 1909-1998), March of Dimes Dance, 1943, Collection of Ron Perisho.

Ms. Mieth moved to California in 1930 and worked with her husband, Otto Hagel, documenting societal effects of the Great Depression. A story they undertook for Life in 1943 about a Japanese internment camp in Wyoming was never published. The couple's leftist leanings and German background resulted in fewer assignments during World War II and the 1950s.

Germaine Krull (German, 1897-1985), André Malraux, 1930, National Gallery of Art, R.K. Mellon Family Foundation. "Sharing an interest in photography and leftist politics" the novelist and photographer became close friends who met in the late 1920s, according to label copy. 

The travels of Germaine Krull  included stops in Germany, Hungary, the Soviet Union, the Netherlands, Brazil, Bangkok, and Paris where she enjoyed success in fashion and advertising photography.  She was expelled from Munich because of her left-wing activism and imprisoned in Russia for her "counterrevolutionary support of the Free French cause against Hitler," says the Museum of Modern Art. Twenty-five books, portfolios, and albums were part of her legacy.  Nearing the end of her life, she moved to India where she took up residency with Tibetan monks.

Galina Sanko (Russian, 1904-1981), Prisoners, Stalingrad, 1943, printed c. 1960s, Robert Koch Gallery

Ms. Sanko's career as a photojournalist began in the 1930s in Siberia, followed by stents as a nurse, a driver, and a mechanic before she became a war correspondent, according to the catalog.  Later, she was sent to the frontlines to shoot major Russian battles, including the siege of Leningrad in 1944. 

Her "Prisoners of Fascism" was used as evidence in the Nuremberg trials, and her works won international awards, including the title, "Honorary Citizen of the City of Gdov" for her pictures of the city's destruction in 1944 and its liberation from the Nazis.  Gdov lies about 150 miles southwest of St Petersburg.
Margaret Bourke-White (American, 1904-1971), Flood Relief, Louisville, Kentucky, 1937, Keith De Lellis, NY, Margaret Bourke-White/The Life Picture Collection via Getty Images

Ms. Bourke-White's name is generally well-known and shares top female photographer's billing with Dorothea Lange (below).  

Henry Luce hired Ms. Bourke-White in 1929 to be the first staff photographer for Fortune.  In 1939 her picture of the Fort Peck Dam appeared on the cover of the first issue of Life where she was named its first female staff photographer, the only photographer there to have her own office, secretary, and lab assistant.  Assignments took her to the Soviet Union, Africa, and Germany for the liberation of concentration camp victims. Her second marriage to the writer, Erskine Caldwell, resulted in their joint book, You Have Seen Their Faces (1937) about sharecroppers in the American South.

It is likely that Ms Bourke-White's interest in industrial photography stemmed from visits with her father to his manufacturing plants and printing presses, starting when she was eight years old.

Flood Relief shows the dichotomy of the happy, make-believe people in the billboard art, contrasted with the standing souls, waiting for aid. 
Dorothea Lange (American, 1895-1965), Drought refugees from Oklahoma camping by the roadside, Blythe, California, August 17, 1936, National Gallery of Art, Washington, gift of Daniel Greenberg and Susan Steinhauser.

If members of the public could name a female photographer, Dorothea Lange would likely come to mind first or second (with Margaret Bourke-White). Ms. Lange worked for various World War II offices and the federal government, taking pictures of immigrants, union members, the homeless, and impoverished. The catalog says she "helped define social documentary photography." 

Note the face of anxiety on the young mother above and the man who exhibits hopelessness and weariness.  What do their faces say to you? What happened to them?
Esther Bubley (American, 1921–1998), Young woman in the doorway of her room at a boardinghouse, Washington, DC, 1943, National Gallery of Art, Washington, Gift of Kent and Marcia Minichiello

A photographer for Life and Ladies Home Journal who often was assigned to shoot celebrities, like Albert Einstein, Marianne Moore, and Charlie Parker, Esther Bubley better enjoyed capturing everyday people, like she did in the scene above. 

Genevieve Naylor (American, 1915–1989), São Januário Trolley, early 1940s,  National Gallery of Art, Washington, Alfred H. Moses and Fern M. Schad Fund.

Before she became Eleanor Roosevelt's personal photographer, Genevieve Naylor worked for the Works Progress Administration and several media outlets. She joined Nelson Rockefeller's Office of Inter-American Affairs whose goals were to strengthen relationships between the U.S. and Latin America where she was based in Brazil, according to catalog copy. When she returned to the U.S., she became the first woman photographer to be honored with a solo exhibition at the Museum of Modern Art which toured the U.S. 1943-44. A visitor who saw the show launched Ms. Naylor's career as a fashion photographer.

She was one of the first women photojournalists to be hired by an American wire service.
Dora Maar (French, 1907-1997) Sans titre (Garçon avec un chat) (Untitled [Boy with a cat]), 1934, The Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Dora Maar was a fashion photographer before she engaged with activist and anti-fascist groups in the 1930s. The catalog describes her fashion work as oneiric, and although some of her pictures were published in the surrealistic publication, Minotaure, and she exhibited works in major surrealistic shows, she was "never" a surrealist. (Huh?) 

Dora, Dora!  How could you fall for Pablo Picasso, the great womanizer?

In 1936 she met him, the sexist who discouraged her interest in photography, "a medium he did not take seriously." (Get lost, Picasso!) She followed his advice, turning to painting which she exhibited in New York and London until the 1990s. 

Like many of Picasso's lovers, she was often his subject who frequently painted her crying, but this is not about him, but about her. (Nevertheless, read more about them at the Frist link below.  He only caused Ms. Maar's nervous breakdown.  What a guy!)

Pablo Picasso (1881-1973), Portrait of Dora Maar, 1937,  
Musée Picasso/Wikipedia. A different portrait of her by Picasso was featured at the Frist Art Museum in Nashville last year. 
Madame Yevonde (b. Yevonde Cumbers, English, 1893-1975), Lady Bridget Poulett, 1935, National Portrait Gallery, London. Above, the photographer has turned her subject into Arethusa, "a mythical nymph who was transformed into a spring," according to the catalog.  The portrait, part of Ms. Yevonde's series, The Goddesses, included a hand-drawn border of playful fish while streams of aquatic cultures flow from the woman's hair.  This apparel reminds me of the Rodarte exhibition at the National Museum of Women in the Arts in 2019.

When she was only 17, Madame Yevonde became a suffragette.  In her career, she photographed notables, believing that women were better suited to make portraits, owing to feminine empathy and patience. She was an early practitioner of color photography which brought her fame and fortune.
Marta Astfalck-Vietz (German, 1901-1994), Untitled, 1927, Berlinische Galerie - Landesmuseum fur Moderne Kunst, Fotografie und Architektur.  This is a self-portrait which, according to the label, "reveals her exploration of masquerade and the increased personal and sexual freedom experienced by growing numbers of women during the 1920s."

At the National Gallery of Art, October 26, 2021/by Patricia Leslie

I must stop researching and writing about the show and its photographers or I'll still be writing long after the pictures come down (which is January 30!).

The more I learn about the photographers, the more I want to learn and return to see their works and read their biographies and find out more about their enticing, engrossing lives and shout:  "Right on, sisters!"

It was 100 years ago when this period of photographs began, when the 19th amendment to the U.S. Constitution was passed, granting women the right to vote in the U.S. (about 25 years after the UK extended the right, and almost 200 years following Sweden's right to vote which was granted female property owners). 

"Right on, sisters!" 

Look at the independence, the strength, the drive in these pictures, some of my favorites which I have included here. The images are stunning and you will remember some long after you have left the show.  

They are not happy pictures: They are telling, historical; they portray the times, presenting society of the era and place, realistic, stark in many cases, representing hundreds of observances of world events, of everyday lives.  

The portraits excel about the time when the "new woman" was emerging to assume independence and rights, values we still strive to reach today. 

Almost 50 lenders, including Sir Elton John and the California African-American Museum, loaned pictures.

An excellent catalog includes almost 300 pages of mostly black and white pictures, some spread over two facing pages, with enlightening brief biographies of most of the photographers.

Thank you, National Gallery of Art and sponsors, the Robert and Mercedes Eichholz Foundation, Trellis Fund, Exhibition Circle of the National Gallery of Art and the Phillip and Edith Leonian Foundation for another spectacular show which gives me confidence to walk another mile.  "That's what art can do!"

The exhibition is organized by the National Gallery of Art, Washington, in association with The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York and curated by Andrea Nelson, associate curator in the department of photographs at the National Gallery of Art. 


Also, upcoming this week is a free two-day virtual symposium, "Global Perspectives on The New Woman Behind the Camera," Jan. 19-20, 2022, featuring talks by historians, curators, and artists, made possible by the James D. and Kathryn K. Steele Fund for Photography.  Register here.  


WhatThe New Woman Behind the Camera


When:  Now through Jan. 30, 2022, 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., every day

Where: Ground floor of the West Building, National Gallery of Art, Washington

How much:  Admission is always free at the National Gallery of Art.

Masks:  Required of all visitors, ages 2 and above, despite vaccinations. 

Metro stations for the National Gallery of Art:
Smithsonian, Federal Triangle, Navy Memorial-Archives, or L'Enfant Plaza

For more information: (202) 737-4215


Accessibility information: (202) 842-6905

patricialesli@gmail.com