George Tice
Aleksandr Rodchenko (1891-1956)
Mother, 1924
Gelatin silver print, printed c. 1960s
11 3/8 x 8 ¼ in. (28.9 x 21 cm)
Artist’s initials (A.M.R.) written by Linhart in pencil on verso
Lubomir Linhart Collection stamp on verso
Matthew Witkovsky wrote of that portrait, "One of Rodchenko's first photographs, this portrait signifies a revolution on many levels. While his mother holds up one half of a pair of spectacles to help her read (a skill she acquired only at fifty), Rodchenko stands before her testing a recently purchased camera, the monocular medium of the future...His mother's face, furrowed in concentration, her work-worn hand, and the kerchief wrapped around her head thereby convey a heroic character without trading in sentimentality. We apprehend the resulting picture, moreover, in much the way that Rodchenko's mother puzzles over her reading. The interaction of hands and lenses has in both cases brought the world radically into focus, magnifying earthshaking changes that, for all their promise of clarity, are still difficult or impossible to comprehend.”
- Matthew Witkovsky, Curator and Chair, Department of Photography, The Art Institute of Chicago
Aleksandr Rodchenko (1891-1956)
Steps, 1929
Gelatin silver print, printed c. 1960s
Image 6 3/8 x 8 7/8 in (16.2 x 22.5 cm)
Paper 6 ½ x 9 1/8 in. (16.5 x 23.2 cm)
Artist’s name, title, and year 1930 written by the artist’s daughter, Varvara Stepanova, in pencil on verso
"A classic example of a new way of seeing, [Steps] is shot employing his choice of a more interesting vantage point. Rigorously modernistic, the image is visually compelling – rhythmic lines glide elegantly at an angle while perfectly complementing the moving silhouette of the Madonna-like mother and baby. It was taken at the steps of Moscow’s 19th Century Orthodox Church of the Holy Saviour which was knocked down in 1931 to make way for the construction of the Palace of the Soviets, which unfortunately failed to be realised.
"In 1929, the Russian socio-political and literary magazine Dayosh frst published this image together with a shot of the wall of Novodevichy Convent, with the shared title “A Summers Day”. An important image to the artist himself, it was shown as part of the 1935 Exhibition of the Work of the Masters of Soviet Photography in Moscow and is said to have bought him some needed favour from Stalin. At the time, his ideals, like those of many other artists, clashed with the increasingly authoritarian government.
"During his lifetime, Rodchenko was heavily criticised for being too formalist in his art. Today, not only is Rodchenko lauded as a visionary but also for his iconic images, which continue to provide artistic stimulation."
Catalogue essay, Phillips Photographs, London, Auction 6 November 2015
Boris Ignatovich (1899-1976)
With a Board, 1929, printed 1960s
Gelatin silver print
9 5/8 x 6 1/2 in. (24.5 x 16.5 cm)
Signature and date in pencil and photographer's stamp on verso
A worker skillfully balances on a piece of lumber while carrying another piece of wood over his shoulder. This photograph is one of the best examples of Constructivist composition. Leading avant-garde artist El Lissitzky incorporated With a Board into his design for the cover of Russland, one of a series of books entitled Neues Bauen in der Welt (1929) that represented the architectural fantasies of America, France, and Russia.
Boris Ignatovich (1899-1976)
Floors, 1928
Gelatin silver print
9 1/2 x 6 1/4 in. (24.1 x 15.9 cm)
Title and 1933 date in pencil in Russian on verso
Photographer's stamp on verso
Aleksandr Rodchenko (1891-1956)
Fire Escape, 1925
Gelatin silver print
5 1/2 x 3 5/8 in. (14.0 x 9.2 cm)
Lubomir Linhart Collection stamp on verso
Aleksandr Rodchenko (1891-1956)
Ambulance, Moscow, 1932
Gelatin silver print
6 x 9 1/2 in. (15.2 x 24.1 cm)
Title, date, photographer’s name in pencil on verso
Boris Ignatovich (1899-1976)
Still Life, 1928, printed c. 1960s
Gelatin silver print
Image 6 5/8 x 9 1/8 in. (16.8 x 23.2 cm)
Paper 7 x 9 1/2 in. (17.8 x 24.1 cm)
Photographer's stamp on verso
Ignatovich documents advances in literacy among the working class in Still Life, 1928; the workers’ hands and the newspaper Soviet Labor, shot from above, are surrounded by the circular shapes of cups, teapots, biscuits, and sausages. Every detail in this perfectly framed composition tells a story of the time in rural Russia of late 1920s.
Boris Ignatovich (1899-1976)
Vladimir Mayakovsky on Red Square, Moscow, 1928
Gelatin silver print
13 x 5 3/4 in. (33.0 x 14.6 cm)
Title and date in pencil in Russian on verso
Photographer's stamp on verso
Alexey Titarenko (b. 1962, St. Petersburg)
Midtown Sunrise, 2018
Gold and selenium toned gelatin silver print
Image 17 1/8 x 17 1/8 in. (43.5 x 43.5 cm)
Paper 19 5/8 x 23 5/8 in. (50 x 60 cm)
Edition of 5
Signed, dated and editioned in pencil on verso
After spending over thirty years photographing the cities of St. Petersburg, Venice, and Havana, in the early 2000s Titarenko turned his lens toward a very different city: New York. In this series, Titarenko brings his longstanding concerns with time and history to bear on a relatively young city known for its relentless, headlong pace. Titarenko is known for applying long exposure to street photography, and this technical innovation reaches its peak in his photographs of New York, where buses, taxis, trains, and planes are in constant movement against a backdrop of both turn-of-the-century façades and the multivalent, overlapping signage of the modern era. In Midtown Sunrise, we see how this use of long exposure combines with Titarenko’s masterful, painterly application of selective toning. An everyday scene, a tree on a busy city block, becomes a moment of awe and grace; Titarenko frames a solitary tree in the center of a whirlwind of passers-by and vehicles, and crowns its branches with a halo of gold.
George Tice (b. 1938, Newark)
Petit's Mobil Station, Cherry Hill, New Jersey, 1974
Platinum print
8 x 10 in. (20.3 x 25.4 cm)
George Tice’s most iconic photograph, Petit’s Mobil Station recalls the magnificent abandon of an Edward Hopper painting, and has become emblematic of the quintessential American urban landscape. Tice photographed Petit’s Mobil Station en route to visit his girlfriend at the time. Exiting the New Jersey turnpike around dusk, Tice propped up his camera on the side of the road and set a 2 minute exposure. To preserve the scene’s serene emptiness — one where the flat-top sedan is the only sign of human activity— Tice covered the lens every time a new car pulled up to the pump. The platinum and palladium that Tice used to print the photograph evokes the richness of light, giving the station an unexpected gravitas.
Porch, Monhegan Island, Maine
1971, printed 2015
Platinum/palladium print
13 3/8 x 8 7/8 in. (34.0 x 22.5 cm)
The Monhegan Island home where Porch was photographed has inspired painters and photographers alike. The painter Rockwell Kent, who built the home, was its first resident — and such paintings as Winter, Monhegan Island, 1907, are testament to his affection for the Maine island. He often received visitors such as Robert Henri, who later wrote of his experiences, “I have never seen anything so fine.” Jamie Wyeth, the son of the late realist painter Andrew Wyeth, was residing in the home when Tice visited in 1971. Tice discovered the home while lodging with the island’s lighthouse keeper nearby. Porch was included in Tice's 1973 series Seacoast Maine: People and Places.
Ann Rhoney (b. 1953)
Niagara, 1979, painted 2017
Vintage gelatin silver print with applied oil paint
Image 9 1/4 x 7 1/4 in. (23.5 x 18.4 cm)
Paper 10 x 8 in. (25.4 x 20.3 cm)
A native of Niagara Falls, Rhoney approaches her work with a painter’s sensitivity to color and light. She applies oil paints by hand to her gelatin-silver prints, allowing each piece to transcend the two-dimensional picture plane. In seemingly black and white photograph of the Niagara, Rhoney creates a powerful vision of the Falls as transparent and luminous against the darkness of the sky, dark waters shimmer with hues of greens, blues and purple.
Albarrán Cabrera (b. 1969, Spain)
#123 from This is You [Here]
Pigment print on gampi paper and gold leaf
10 14 x 6 7/8 in. (26 x 17.5 cm)
Edition 13/20
This is You [HERE] is an ongoing series of photographs of a fictitious family. The figures’ identities are often partially obscured. The artists combine found photographs with their own artworks to raise questions about the unreliability of memory and the ways our memory skews, distorts, and reinvents our lived experience over time. The mesmerising radiance of this image somewhat echoes with Klimt’s portrait of The Woman in Gold.
Albarrán Cabrera (b. 1969, Spain)
#143 from This is You [Here]
Pigment print on gampi paper and gold leaf
10 3/5 x 7 1/8 in. (27 x 18 cm)
Edition 10/20
Albarrán Cabrera (b. 1969, Spain)
#147 from This is You [Here]
Pigment print on gampi paper and gold leaf
10 1/4 x 6 5/8 in. (26 x 17 cm)
Edition 3/20
Albarrán Cabrera (b. 1969)
#138 from This is You [Here]
Pigment print on gampi paper and gold leaf
6 5/8 x 10 1/4 in. (17 x 26 cm)
Edition 1/20
"The structure of cities, the architecture of houses, squares, gardens, public walks, gateways, railway stations, etc – all these provide us with the basic principles of a great Metaphysical aesthetic... We, who live under the sign of the Metaphysical alphabet, we know the joy and sorrows to be found in a gateway, a street corner, a room, on the surface of a table, between the sides of a box…"
-Giorgio de Chirico
Denis Brihat (b. 1928, Paris)
Gardenia, 1994, printed 2001
Gelatin silver print with sulfuration
15 x 19 1/8 in. (38.1 x 48.6 cm)
Edition of 4 A.P.
In 1958, dissatisfied with urban life and commercial work, photographer Denis Brihat left Paris for the Luberon region of Provence. Undeterred by the isolation and the rustic conditions – he had neither electricity nor running water – he built a darkroom and studio on the Plateau des Claparèdes and began his groundbreaking experiments in photography, printmaking, and, above all, observation, turning his eye toward the quotidien but dazzling beauty of the natural world. “The subjects he favoured, in nature or his close surroundings, weren’t unusually beautiful, but simple, and of the sort that often passes unnoticed,” writes photographer Pierre-Jean Amar. “His eminently poetic style of photography glorified them and paid them due tribute, inviting people to open their eyes and recognize the proximity of grace.”
Influenced by the masterful prints of Edward Weston and the frescos of Fernand Léger, Brihat came to produce what he called “photographic paintings” – unique, archival, material prints, made for the wall, rather than images meant for mass reproduction in the pages of a magazine. This concern with process and technique finds its apotheosis in his remarkable experiments with color, which he began as early as 1968, in the wake of acclaimed exhibitions of his work at the Musée des Arts Décoratifs in Paris and the Museum of Modern Art in New York. Brihat’s richly colored photographs of fruits and flowers begin as traditional black-and-white darkroom prints, which he then tones with the salts of gold, iron, selenium, vanadium, and uranium, among other metals. The reaction of these metals with the silver salts in the emulsion produces hues that are original, one-of-a-kind, and permanent. The resulting prints exude a vividness and a luminosity that are truly unequalled in color photography.
Ingar Krauss (b. 1965, East Berlin)
Black locust blossom, Zechin, 2014
Gelatin silver print with applied oil paint
20 ½ x 17 3/8 in. (52 x 44 cm)
Edition 5/8
In 2010, Krauss began working on a series of still lifes – embarking, in effect, on a new form of portraiture, one in which his subjects were not human faces and personalities but the flora and fauna of the natural world. Krauss carefully arranges his pears, quinces, lilacs, and taxidermied animals in stage-like boxes of his own construction, then shoots the composition under natural light and creates a gelatin-silver print to which he applies a delicate glaze of oil paint. Some subjects are suspended from a string at the top of the box, while others are positioned in the foreground against a deep, darkening depth of field, echoing the work of the dramatic Baroque Spanish still-life painter Juan Sánchez Cotán (1560-1627) and placing the natural world, both literally and metaphorically, on a pedestal.
As Krauss explained in a 2017 interview with Roberta Levy, "Since I moved my studio from Berlin to the Brandenburg countryside, I became a gardener and dedicate a lot of time to plants and vegetables, and so they naturally became a privileged pictorial subject – in the tradition of German Romanticism and its longing for self-knowledge in nature. I am photographing the fruits and vegetables by arranging them in simple still lifes, using sometimes also dead birds or other animals which I found around my garden or which I got from old men in the neighborhood who are hunting and fishing. I am interested in the hidden relationship between the inner life of human beings and the world of plants and animals, and I want to transmute those commonplace subjects by a process of replacing inattention with contemplation."
Pentti Sammallahti (b. 1950, Helsinki)
The Balearics, Spain, 2014
Gelatin silver print
Image 7 1/2 x 6 1/2 in. (19.1 x 16.5 cm)
Paper 8 x 10 in. (20.3 x 25.4 cm)
Pentti Sammallahti (b. 1950, Helsinki)
Lake Numakawa, Japan, 2005
Toned gelatin silver print
Image: 9 7/8 x 8 in. (25.1 x 20.3 cm)
Paper: 11 7/8 x 9 1/2 in. (30.2 x 24.1 cm)
Pentti Sammallahti (b. 1950, Helsinki)
Helsinki, Finland (dog stretching), 1982
Gelatin silver print
Image 6 x 6 1/2 in. (15.2 x 16.5 cm)
Paper 8 x 10 in. (20.3 x 25.4 cm)
Pentti Sammallahti (b. 1950, Helsinki)
Solovki, White Sea, Russia, 1992
Gelatin silver print
Image: 6 1/2 x 14 in. (16.5 x 35.6 cm)
Paper: 9 1/2 x 15 7/8 in. (24.1 x 40.3 cm)
Signed and dated in pencil on recto
This is one of the most iconic images taken in the North of Russia by the White Sea in winter of 1992, right after the collapse of the Soviet Union. Sammallahti created a humorous seires, many images populated with dogs, taken in the village famous for the Solovetsky monastery which was established duing the time of Ivan the Terrible and in 1921 turned into a Gulag camp.
Sammallahti describes himself as a wanderer who appreciates the nature of the great north, the silence, the cold, and the sea, and records the relationships between animals and their environments.
Pentti Sammallahti (b. 1950, Helsinki)
Ristisaari, Finland (frog in water), 1974
Gelatin silver print
Image 7 7/8 x 6 3/8 in. (20 x 16.2 cm)
Paper 9 7/8 x 8 in. (25.1 x 20.3 cm)
A landmark figure in contemporary Finnish photography, Sammallahti was 24 when he took this photograph of a frog. His early photographs create a fairy-tale world, mysterious legends of forests and lakes. He has a supernatural sense of a moment in time with the sensitivity to the beauty and wonder of the world.
Pentti Sammallahti (b. 1950, Helsinki)
Western Cape, South Africa (dog and bird), 2002
Gelatin silver print
Image 6 1/4 x 8 3/4 in. (15.9 x 22.2 cm)
Paper 7 7/8 x 9 7/8 in. (20 x 25.1 cm)
