"I don't have a philosophy, I have a camera." Saul LeiterĪn iconoclast who pursued his vision through signature framing devices, bold hues and relective surfaces, Leiter manages to transform seemingly ordinary street scenes in close proximity to his New York apartment into visual poetry. Instinctively for him, colour was the picture. He moved to New York intent on becoming a painter, which he continued in parallel with his photography, yet ended up working for magazines such as Harper's Bazaar, Elle and British Vogue and became known for his fashion work.Īs early as 1946, and thus two decades before the 1970s new colour photography school (William Eggleston, Stephen Shore et al), Leiter was using Kodachrome colour slide film for his free artistic shots, despite it being despised by artists of the day. Whether rain, fog or snow, from busy streets to empty roads, Leiter found fragments of life worth recording in the seemingly mundane.It seems remarkable that Saul Leiter (1923-2013) is only just beginning to acquire significant mainstream recognition for his pioneering role in the emergence of colour photography. “I go out with my camera, and I take pictures because I enjoy catching certain moments,” he wrote.
The publication spans the artist’s lengthy career, exploring his influences and muses, and includes diaristic excerpts providing insight into his life, character and uncomplicated approach to documenting the city. Now, a selection of 247 previously-unseen works discovered in this process is published in a new book, titled Forever Saul Leiter. Following his death, the foundation initiated a survey of the archive, which comprises more than 80,000 works, including colour and black-and-white photography, paintings, and notes. Seeing is a neglected enterprise, Leiter once said. Using temperamental expired film, Leiter saw the streets in sharp punches of red and vast seas of shadow. Leiter’s studio in New York’s East Village, where he lived from 1953 until he died in 2013, is now home to his eponymous foundation. As New York’s famous mid-century photographers set out to capture the city in shades of black and gray, Saul Leiter rendered its unassuming details in expressive color. However, his early work from the mid-1900s contributed to what came to be recognised as the New York school of photography, placing him alongside practitioners including Diane Arbus, Richard Avedon, Robert Frank and Weegee. His work remained relatively unsung until the 1980s.
“Photographs are often treated as capturing important moments, but they are really small fragments and memories of the world that never ends.” So said American photographer and painter Saul Leiter (1923-2013).
Spanning the artist’s lengthy career, the book includes 247 works, as well as diaristic excerpts that provide an insight into his life, character and uncomplicated approach to documenting the city
0 kommentar(er)
