At the heart of the display are daring new depictions of the human body including an exceptionally rare portrait of Lee Miller by Man Ray entitled Neck (1929), which employs soft-focus and cropping to reduce her bust to an ecstatically erotic abstraction. A newly-discovered and most extraordinary print, Nude (Miriam Lerner, torso, hand on hip) (1925) by Edward Weston, frames the angles and folds of Lerner’s body, creating a soft, sensuous composition. Similarly, in an early, oversized printing of Bill Brandt’s Nude, Belgravia, London (1951), the camera focuses on a faceless nude, with the wide-angle lens distorting the curves of the limbs; the result is simultaneously sensual and depersonalised. Moving beyond the nude, a unique print of Gerald Warburg, Cellist (1929) by Imogen Cunningham cuts out all extraneous detail to emphasise the poised, expressive hand of the musician, reducing him to one emphatic symbol of his craft.
Social documentary photography is exemplified by Workers, Grand Coulee Dam, Columbia Basin Project, Washington State (1937) by Margaret Bourke-White which depicts a cheerful crowd of workers gathered in front of a jarringly cautionary Depression-era billboard. Consuelo Kanaga’s Frances with Flower (1930-1932) epitomises her humane and sympathetic portraiture of her African American sitters, a radical act in segregationist America. A standout in the exhibition is The Labyrinth Deciphered, Veracruz, Mexico (1932) by Manuel Álvarez Bravo capturing a young Mexican girl hanging tobacco, his most experimental image and only known use of double-exposure.
Rare images of London by the late great master of American photography Robert Frank promise to be a must-see highlight. Frank, who passed away in September of last year, travelled to the UK in the 1950s and made studies of the different regions with his Leica camera. An oversized vintage print entitled City of London (Negative: 1951: Print: 1957 – c.1960) is believed to be the only known example of Frank printing on this unusual paper stock, which may have been used to amplify the dark chill of the London winter. Frank’s enigmatic Hearse (Negative: 1951, Print: 1970s) is another iconic example of the photographer’s exquisitely composed street scenes.
