André Kertész at International Center of Photography

Monday, 19 September 2005 11:13

NEW YORK.- The International Center of Photography presents André Kertész, a major retrospective of a photographer who could aptly be described as a "visual poet". In a 70-year career, which spanned much of the 20th century, André Kertész (1894-1985) made some of the most deceptively simple yet compelling and poetic photographs ever created. The exhibition will be the first major Kertész retrospective of vintage photographs held in the New York ; also, the show will present works never before exhibited or reproduced. Including some of the most celebrated works in 20th-century photography--such as Chez Mondrian and Satiric Dancer, both from 1926--120 objects will feature photographs from all periods of Kertész's exceptionally rich and diverse body of work: from his early photographs of his native Budapest made in the 1910s and early 1920s, to his studies of Paris in the 1920s and 1930s, and the final series of photographs he took of New York in the 1970s and 1980s, shortly before his death. The Exhibition - Arranged chronologically, the exhibition surveys the development of Kertész's oeuvre. It demonstrates his deep involvement with other artists of his time and shows how he used the camera to examine his relationship to the people and things around him. Kertész is revealed as emblematic of a generation of 20th-century artists whose migrations allowed them to rethink the nature and aims of their art as they sought to reconcile their native sensibilities with new cultures. Born Kertész Andor, he began photographing in 1912. When he served in the Austro-Hungarian army in World War I, he packed a camera. He took photographs not of the battles or destruction of the war, but of soldiers during their rare moments of leisure. After the war, he became fascinated with recording scenes of active, physically fit young people exuberantly enjoying life, such as his portrait of his brother, Jenő Kertész (1919-1924). Kertész in Paris - In 1925, after several desultory years working in a variety of jobs in Budapest, Kertész Andor decided to pursue a career in photography. Like so many artists and intellectuals of the period, he moved to Paris, where he changed his name to André Kertész. Never fluent in French, he was closest to his fellow Hungarians, including the painters Lajos Tihanyi, Gyula Zilzer, and István Beőthy. He also met and photographed such luminaries as Marc Chagall, Colette, Sergei Eisenstein, Tristan Tzara, and many others. One of his best-known works, Chez Mondrian (1926), depicts Mondrian's vestibule. He also founded The André and Elizabeth Kertész Foundation in New York and dedicated it to supporting the arts and preserving his legacy. He continued to explore the world through his camera with his characteristic playful curiosity almost up to his death; he died at home in New York on September 28, 1985.

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