12 September 2005

BILL BRANDT: A RETROSPECTIVE

Rare and famous prints from the Brandt archive visit Paris
21 September – 18 December 2005

Paris, France (12th September, 2005) – The Bill Brandt Archive proudly presents this retrospective in association with the Henri Cartier-Bresson Foundation (HCB). The relatively new HCB, situated in an old workshop building in Montparnasse is now recognised as one of Paris' most prestigious venues for the contemplation and appreciation of fine art photography.

Brandt and Cartier-Bresson had a relationship of mutual respect but their work was very different. Cartier-Bresson's approach to the 'decisive moment' frequently left Brandt nonplussed as he himself worked in a much more serious and studied and personal way to craft the world in his viewfinder to his own perceptions. Cartier-Bresson did not make his own prints, preferring commercial labs, in direct contrast to Brandt who spent countless hours in the darkroom.(1)

The exhibition is perhaps the most accomplished and certainly the most widely seen exhibition ever by Brandt. It has now shown in four countries and at ten venues, allowing his work to be shown to a whole new generation of photography lovers. Mark Hayworth-Booth formerly of London's V&A says, “This is a very special exhibition of Bill Brandt’s work – the essential works of an essential photographer, using rare prints from his own archive. It is the finest selection of his prints to be seen for over 30 years.”

Brandt’s career began in Vienna in 1928 before he moved to Paris in 1929 where he assisted Man Ray. He settled in London in 1931 and freelanced for illustrated magazines, becoming the great documentarian of British cultural and social life. The exhibition includes arresting images of the East End, the northern industrial heartlands and the moonlit streets of blacked-out London at the beginning of the Second World War. Brandt also photographed the crowds sheltering in Underground stations during the Blitz. Experimenting with the landscape form, he travelled on wartime trains to the most poetic of Britain’s scenic settings. The exhibition features evocative images of Thomas Hardy’s ‘Wessex’ and the Bronte sisters’ Yorkshire Moors.

After the war, Brandt turned to nudes, portraits and further landscapes, returning to his interest in the surreal. He acquired a wide-angle Kodak camera and began to photograph nudes, first in Victorian interiors and then outside on the beaches of England and France. These dramatic, sculptural images of nudes merging with the landscape radically revised the photography of the nude.

From the 1940s onwards, Brandt became a sought-after portraitist. Capable of conveying the very essence of his subjects, he produced revealing images of figures such as Pablo Picasso, Henry Moore, Francis Bacon and Graham Greene, all included in the exhibition.

Bill Brandt: A Retrospective, curated by John-Paul Kernot, is organized by the Bill Brandt Archive and is circulated by Curatorial Assistance Travelling Exhibitions (CATE), Los Angeles.

Opening hours
From Wednesday to Sunday : 1 PM to 6.30 PM
Saturday : 11 AM to 6.45 PM
Late night Wednesdays until 8.30 PM
Closed on Mondays, Tuesdays and public holidays
Closed in August, and between Christmas and New Year

Admission
4 € Adults
3 € Students, Seniors and unemployed
Free on Wednesday evening (6.30 PM - 8.30 PM)

For PUBLIC enquiries please telephone +331 56 80 27 00; visit www.henricartierbresson.org

(1) Photography in the 20th Century / Tausk