Wednesday 9th April 2003

Bill Brandt: A Retrospective
Exhibition Of Rare Vintage Photographs Opens at The Yale Center for British Art

April 16th 2003 - July 20th 2003
The Yale Center for British Art, MA--

The wide ranging work of British master photographer Bill Brandt (1904-1983) will be explored in a comprehensive exhibition Bill Brandt: A Retrospective. From his early work documenting the social contrasts of life in 1930s Britain to his later experimentation with a surrealistic style, this exhibition spans Brandt's career in an extensive assemblage of 155 vintage gelatin silver prints from the Bill Brandt Archive in London. Brandt's vision, unconfined by easy categories, extends from photojournalism to moody, atmospheric landscapes to stark, revealing portraiture to high-contrast nudes, distorted with very wide-angle lenses.

Brandt once wrote, "Photography is still a very new medium and everything is allowed and everything should be tried."

Born in Germany, Brandt worked as Man Ray's assistant in Paris in 1929 before coming to London in the 1930s to become a photojournalist. In contrast with his contemporaries in Depression-era America, Brandt developed an expressive, high-key style that pushed accepted boundaries of documentary and journalism.

After World War II, Brandt left his documentary work behind and returned to an interest in surrealism. His formally challenging and haunting nude studies from this period are considered today some of his most innovative work. At the same time, he developed the symbolist potential of photography in a series of landscapes inhabited by the spirit of Romanticism. Himself an important figure of the British artistic and intellectual scene, Brandt produced striking portraits of celebrated contemporaries, such as Francis Bacon, E.M. Forster, René Magritte and Henry Moore.

Bill Brandt: A Retrospective, curated by John-Paul Kernot, is organized by the Bill Brandt Archive Ltd and is circulated by Curatorial Assistance, Los Angeles, CA.

The Yale Herald
Brandt is the creator of some of the most iconic photographs of the 20th century, arguably unrivaled in British photography in terms of popularity and influence.

The Yale Daily News
"These are prints that Brandt himself kept and worked on. His hand work is evident on the prints," said Amy Meyers, director of the British Art Center. "It's quite an extraordinary exhibition for us, it's particularly provocative."

The Yale Bulletin & Calendar
Works by Bill Brandt, who is credited with having created more memorable images than any other British photographer of the 20th century, will be on view in a new exhibition opening on Wednesday, April 16, at the Yale Center for British Art.