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Art Of The Day Weekly

#322 - from 14 November 2013 to 20 November 2013


Eugenio Recuenco, Cinderella Courtesy galerie Camera Work (Paris Photo).

IN THE AIR

Paris succombs to photography in 15 events

Every two years, during the autumn, Paris hosts the photography week - Mois de la photo- with at least one hundred exhibitions, and has actually inspired a number of other events throughout the world, from Vancouver to Bamako. What happens on the “odd” years, those like 2013 without the big event? The program remains very rich given an efficient imitation effect. Paris Photo has chosen this season to impose itself as the main world fair in this discipline, while auction houses bring out their most beautiful lots for specialized sales. The following offers are only a partial reflection of what is available …

FAIRS

1 Paris Photo

For its 17th edition, Paris Photo brings together 136 galleries and 28 world editors. The most important are all present, such as Aperture, Contrasto, Eric Franck, Edward Greenberg, Edwynn Houk, Bruce Silverstein, to mention but a few. The guests of honor are the private collections of Harald Falckenberg (set up in Hamburg) and of JPMorgan Chase, while the three institutions invited to show their latest purchases proove the internationalization of the market (the Folkwang museum in Essen, Instituto Moreira Salles in Rio de Janeiro, the musée des Beaux-Arts from Ontario).
Paris Photo at the Grand Palais, from 14 to 17 November 2013.

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2 Fotofever

This "satellite" fair like all major event deserves to have - Fotofever - has a few great names in his address book (like Foam of Amsterdam) but especially suggests a selection of young galleries focused on current creation.
Fotofever at the Carrousel du Louvre, from 15 to 17 November 2013.

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EXHIBITIONS


Raymond Depardon, Self-portrait with a Rolleiflex (set on a wall) 1st scooter of the Italian brand "Rumi", press label on the back fender, Ile Saint-Louis. Paris, 1959 ©Raymond Depardon/Magnum Photos

3 Raymond Depardon

He is one of the icons of French photography, and has worked in all genres, from social reporting in the asylums in Venice to his journey across rural France in a camping-car, including the presidential campaign of Valéry Giscard d’Estaing. The angle for this retrospective is different, the color photographs in his work. In order to prepare for it, he has once again zigzagged across the globe and brought back unique shots.
Raymond Depardon, un moment si doux at the Grand Palais, from 14 November 2013 to 10 February 2014.

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4 Yousuf Karsh

His life is like a novel: he escaped the anti-Armenian pogroms in Turkey and rebuilt his life in Canada, where he became the photographer of the mighty and the artists. Yousuf Karsh (1908-2002) immortalized Churchill (surely his most famous photograph), Grace Kelly, Kennedy, as well as Helen Keller, Malraux or Christian Dior, in perfectly clean black and white shots.
Yousuf Karsh: Icônes du XXe siècle at the Mona Bismarck American Center, from 16 October 2013 to 26 January 2014.

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5 América latina 1960-2013

The exhibition will undoubtedly attract less people than Ron Mueck and his characters but it is definitely worth the visit, as it covers half a century full of sound and fury: 400 images describe the urban explosion in Venezuela, the violence in Colombia or the dictatorship in Chile. With its 30 filmed interviews, a documentary of Paraguayan Fredi Casco synthetizes the vitality of the continent’s photography.
América latina 1960-2013, photographies at the Fondation Cartier, from 19 November 2013 to 6 April 2014.

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Erwin Blumenfeld ,Natalia Pasco. Gelatine-silver proof, development of the times. Collection Henry Blumenfeld. © The Estate of Erwin Blumenfeld

6 Erwin Blumenfeld

He is one of the greatest names in fashion photography in the XXth century. But, as in the case of Irving Penn or Helmut Newton, his production cannot be limited to this sole field. In fact, the exhibition plays on the plurality of interests Erwin Blumenfeld (1897-1969) nourished. Aside from his shots, it also shows the artist’s drawings and his photomontages over half a century.
Erwin Blumenfeld at the Jeu de paume, from 15 October 2013 to 26 January 2014.

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Brassaï, Vue nocturne sur Paris de Notre-Dame, 1933. © Brassaï

7 Brassaï

Following the earlier exhibitions dedicated to Doisneau and Ronis, this one explores the relationship between this native Hungarian photographer and Paris, his city of adoption. Les Halles, the brothels, the wet pavement, the graffiti and all those who made the city move, from Picasso to Blaise Cendrars…
Brassaï, pour l’amour de Paris at the Hôtel de Ville, from 8 November 2013 to 8 March 2014.

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8 Hiroshi Sugimoto

All the opposite from the previous artist, Hiroshi Sugimoto (born in 1948) is one of the most conceptual contemporary photographers. A series of three photographs of seascapes sold for over one million euros in 2007 at Christie’s in New York. The exhibition combines his images with some pieces from its collection of antiques.
Hiroshi Sugimoto. Accelerated Buddha at the Fondation Pierre Bergé Yves Saint Laurent, from 10 October 2013 to 26 January 2014

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9 Anders Petersen

He came to be known at the beginning of the 70s for his series Café Lehmitz, the name of a bar in Hamburg, where dock workers, thieves and prostitutes used to hang out, and where he spent a great part of his time. Anders Petersen (born in 1944) continued making very personal social reports on this same vein. The BnF presents 330 photographs that sum up all his career up to the most recent Soho and Roma.
Anders Petersen at the bibliothèque nationale de France, from 13 November 2013 to 2 February 2014.

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10 Strömholm and Engström

They are both Swedish and give us their vision of Paris. That of JH Engtröm (born in 1969) is contemporary while that of Christer Strömholm (1918-2002), Petersen’s master, goes back to the middle of last century and includes, in particular, the famous series on the transsexuals of place Blanche. A contemporary of Ingmar Bergman –who stole his wife – also left numerous portraits of artists, from Le Corbusier to Spoerri.
2x à Paris : Engström et CHR Strömholm at the Institut suédois, from 15 November 2013 to 12 January 2014.

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Franco Pagetti, Veiled Alep

11 Franco Pagetti

He is a member of the famous agence VII and covered all the conflicts around the world. The images Franco Pagetti shows make one think of Buren: large striped canvases unfurl in an urban universe. As one gets near though one realizes it is a camouflage to avoid being the target of mavericks in devastated Alep in 2013.
Franco Pagetti at the galerie Vallois, from 6 to 30 November 2013.

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AUCTIONS

12 The treasures of the Institut catholique

When a private museum mentions the sale of part of its collections, it usually triggers off a wave of protests - see the recent episode of the DIA in Detroit. Other institutions seem to be able to get rid of their collections without creating any havoc. It is the case of the Institut Catholique de Paris that will be putting some of its treasures up for sale to finance the development of its campus. The major work is the famous in-folio format portfolio of Désiré Charnay (1857-1860) on the Maya sites in Mexico, one of the three complete ones with those of the BNF and the museum of quai Branly (€200 000). There will also be a beautiful Italian series (Naya on Venice, De Bonis on Rome, Sommer on Naples), a few historical shots taken by Dimitri Ermakov during his trip to the Caucasus, the strange series by Enrie on the Holy Shrewd of Turin (less known and not as expensive as that of Secondo Pia) or even that of Duchenne de Boulogne on the use of electricity in psychiatric treatment at la Pitié Salpêtrière. The Institut catholique will certainly be wealthier in Euros but will have relinquished a unique treasure …
Fonds photographique de l'Institut catholique at Hôtel Drouot (SVV Ader) 17 November 2013.

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13 The Agathe Gaillard collection

She was a pioneer gallery owner in the field of photography. As she decides to retire, she is doing it in grand style. Agathe Gaillard will simultaneously publish her autobiography (Mémoires d’une galeriste chez Gallimard) and will offer a sale with her emblematic pieces. These shots – from Alvarez-Bravo to Cartier-Bresson, from Boubat to Larry Clark – summing up 38 years of activity at rue du Pont Louis-Philippe from its opening exhibition dedicated to Ralph Gibson in 1975 up to its closing in the Spring of 2013.
Agathe Gaillard et la photographie : une pionnière à Paris at Christie’s on 14 November 2013.

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Lot 172. La rue sans joie : Greta Garbo in a movie by Georg Wilhelm Pabst (1925). Silver proof from the time on cardboard-type paper (23x29.5 cm, margins included). Estimate: €500. Courtesy Kapandji-Morhange.

14 The world of movies

Photography and movies have gone hand in hand from the beginning as can be seen in this selection of images. Silver prints from the shooting of Tunnel sous la Manche by Georges Méliès (1907) or of Cabinet du docteur Caligari, including Marcel L’Herbier, Murnau, Un chien andalou or L’Ange bleu, up to Scarface by Brian De Palma or Copycat by Jon Amiel, this practically covers a century of cinema that is thus immortalized.
Objectif cinéma at Hôtel Drouot on 15 November 2013 (SVV Kapandji-Morhange)

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15 From the Nile to Diane Arbus

Sotheby’s was one of the pioneers in sales of photography in Paris. We can well remember the Jammes collection and the record price for the Vague by Le Gray. It is currently offering a series of shots from various periods (Ansel Adams, Josef Sudek, Diane Arbus, etc.) Among the most original lots of the sale, travel albums by Aymard de Banville in Egypt (1863-64) and by Casimir Zagourski in Africa (1920).
Photographies at Sotheby's on 15 November 2013.

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BOOKS

Larrain, a non-typical Magnum

He is like a meteorite in photo-reporting: Chilean Sergio Larrain entered Magnum in 1959 after charming Cartier-Bresson. He was 28 years old. For a couple of years he covered the world over, from the Mafia in Italy to Iran. Then, tired of the requests and compromises of the profession, he chose to return to Chile and got interested in the poorest communities, like those of children without families in Santiago, or a mythic town like Valparaiso, of which he left a definite portrait. Though he was not yet 40 years old, Larrain chose to be isolated in the Northern area of Chile, in Arica. Through meditation and yoga he sought answers to his existentialist questionings. The book that accompanies the retrospective at the fondation Cartier-Bresson presents his main series and is enriched by drawings (satori), texts and letters which this unique photographer always considered as part of his creation, which went on until his demise in 2012.
Sergio Larrain, directed by Agnès Sire, text by Gonzalo Leiva Quijada, published by Xavier Barral, 2013, 400 p., €65.

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OPENINGS OF THE WEEK