A NEW ICONIC "KISS" PHOTO?

The kiss ... Vancouver riot police surround an embracing couple. Photograph: Rich Lam/Getty Images


An Interesting article from the Guardian Newspaper:

Vancouver's kiss of life

The last thing we expected was an authentically romantic picture to emerge from this rioting city of glass

Douglas Haddow
Guardian.co.uk, Friday 17 June 2011 18.10 BST

Vancouver, "the world's most livable city", has been devastated. Not so much by the riotous violence that came soon after the Canucks lost the Stanley Cup, but by what the international media's coverage of the carnage may mean for the city's image.

City hall, the province of British Columbia, and indeed the federal government of Canada, are worried that potential tourists will no longer think of Vancouver as a city of yoga pants, sushi and skiing, but of mayhem and fire.

Despite all the sorrow and disgust expressed by Vancouverites over the PR fallout, one image, absent of violence or destruction, has come to define the riot.

We see a young couple laid out on the street, embraced in a kiss, juxtaposed between a blurry riot cop running towards the camera and a line of police charging a crowd in the background.

Once the photograph hit the internet, it became a viral phenomenon in minutes. Already the uncontested frontrunner for the photo of the year, it's being compared to other historical kisses like Robert Doisneau's 'The Kiss' and Alfred Eisenstadt's picture of a kissing couple in Times Square on VJ day.

At first glance, the photo seemed too good to be documentary fact. For many internet flâneurs, myself included, it was too romantic and poignant to be of this world. The breathless idealism of the lover's embrace was in such stark contrast to the mindless rampage occurring around them that the internet's cynical instincts kicked in.

How could such authenticity exist in Vancouver, a city of glass that has spent the last 20 years standing in as a discount soundstage for New York and Los Angeles. You'll find no romance in these streets, unless it's a bit of marketing-related artifice.

Shortly before going to bed in the very wee hours on Thursday morning, my suspicions seemed to be confirmed when I came across an alternate angle of the couple's moment, shot on a camera phone from above, that surely proved the kiss was either contrived or worse.

I immediately posted it on my Tumblr blog and woke up eight hours later to discover that I had unwittingly broken the story that the photograph was indeed not what it seemed. Thousands debated, some kept the faith, others declared that they didn't care if was real or not, and a few claimed they had lost all faith in humanity. A mystery was born. Was it real or not?

Over the following hours the story evolved.

An Australian woman contacted the media with what is apparently the inside scoop. Yes, the couple had been knocked to the ground, but they were fine – the photo taken at the very second the boyfriend gave his girlfriend a reassuring kiss amid the chaos.

When we look at the riot photos, images that are said to have permanently soiled Vancouver's reputation, we see young men acting out for the camera, revelling in the worst kind of apolitical theatre. Through the haze of this absurd and dispiriting pantomime, Richard Lam has captured an image of the rarest form. One that is as authentic as it is romantic and speaks to a present cultural context but also contains a certain timeless virtue.

What differentiates this riot from the countless other sports riots of the last decade is that Vancouver is pathologically self-aware. Its economy is dependent on the city's ability to portray itself as a quasi-utopia, and its citizens and politicians are obsessed with achieving the nebulous status of "world class".

The irony here is that Vancouver has at last produced an iconic image that rivals those of Paris and New York, but it needed to shatter its own fantasy to do so.

Spring Auctions Looking Bright

Via Photograph Magazine
Posted April 12, 2011 by Jean Dykstra


The weather still felt a bit wintry, but the spring photography auctions suggested that a new season might be upon us. The sales had lower buy-in rates than we’ve been seeing (under 20 percent for most) and totals surpassing the firms' estimates. Sotheby’s kicked off the season on April 6 with a successful general-owners sale totaling $5,632,187, and a buy-in rate of 18.8 percent. Jaromir Funke’s abstract Composition, 1929, set a record for the artist at auction, selling for $350,500, far above the $70,000 high estimate. Mathew Brady’s portrait of politician John C. Calhoun, from 1849, sold for $338,500, also above the high estimate of $50,000. Two Man Ray images sold in the top ten: Untitled (Photomontage with Nude and Studio Lamp), 1933, was the top lot, bringing a whopping $410,500, and Solarized Male Torso, 1936, sold for $122,500.

On a side note, Sotheby's announced in February that it has made Paris its European center for photographs and decorative arts. Sotheby's won't hold photo sales in London, but the firm will hold bi-annual sales in Paris in May and in November, to coincide with Paris Photo and capitalize on the active market for photography in Paris. The department is headed by Simone Klein, who joined the firm in 2007.

Christie’s had three photography sales in April: Part I of the Consolidated Freightways collection, which focuses on American photography, was sold on April 7; 130 lots were offered, and the buy-in rate was 15 percent. The top lot was Robert Mapplethorpe’s Flag, 1987, which brought $158,500. That same day, a private collection went on the block, in a sale dubbed "The Feminine Ideal;" it brought a total of $942,125, with 18 percent of the 79 lots sold. Given that the sale focused on female beauty, it was no surprise that the top three lots were by Irving Penn, or that two of them should feature Lisa Fonssagrives-Penn. Balenciaga Mantle Coat, Paris, 1950, sold for $80,500, and Woman with Umbrella (Lisa Fonssagrives-Penn), New York, 1950, brought $60,000. Penn’s photographs, reliable favorites in the marketplace, were also top sellers in the general-owners photographs sale on April 8, with Bee on Lips, New York, September 22, 1995, selling for $182,500. Twentieth-century masters such as Avedon, Eggleston, Penn, and Frank were well represented in the top lots, with Avedon’s Marilyn Monroe, New York, May 6, 1957, bringing $482,500, and Eggleston’s iconic Memphis (Tricycle), c. 1969-1970, selling for $266,500

Robert Mapplethorpe, Flag. Courtesy Christie's New York

On April 9, Phillips de Pury and Company held its first photography sale in its new digs at 450 Park Avenue. The sale offered 260 lots, and totaled $5,802,250, with a slim 9.6 percent buy-in rate. Phillips’s chief auctioneer, Simon de Pury, held a Photographs Aficionado Class before the auction, and he conducted the sale as well. The top ten list included such contemporary works as Cindy Sherman’s Oriental-themed Untitled #278, which sold for $242,500. Dutch photographer Desiree Dolron’s Xteriors VI, referencing the history of Flemish portraiture, brought $194,500, well above its high estimate of $60,000. Peter Beard’s Tsavo North on the Athi Tiva, circa 150 lbs, - 160 lbs, side Bull Elephant, February, sold for $120,100. And Florian Maier-Aichen’s contemporary take on the Sublime, Untitled, 2005, brought $104,500.

Desiree Dolron, Xteriors VI. Courtesy Phillips de Pury and Company

Two weeks earlier, photobooks, photographic albums, and historical and 20th-century photographs sold well Swann Galleries on March 24. The total was $1,037,574, with a 20 percent buy-in rate. Adam Clark Vroman’s album Arizona and New Mexico, Volume II, with more than 165 platinum prints of Native Americans, from 1897, sold for $62,400, a record for the photographer at auction and Alfred Eisenstaedt’s Children at Puppet Theatre, Paris, 1963, printed 1991, brought $48,000, the top price for an individual photograph at the sale.

Swann Auction: Yesterday's top selling photograph was Alfred Eisenstaedt's Children at Puppet Theater, 1963

The Spring auction season has started. First up yesterday, Swann (via Swann blog)


FRIDAY, MARCH 25, 2011
Yesterday's Top Lots: Fine Photographs

Adam Clark Vroman, Arizona and New Mexico, Volume II, album with more than 165 platinum prints, 1897. Sold for $62,400 on March 24, 2011.


Two rare photographic albums were the top lots in yesterday's Fine Photographs auction at Swann. Adam Clark Vroman's Arizona and New Mexico, Volume II, 1897, which featured more than 165 platinum prints of Native Americans, their dwellings, the famous Snake Dance and more, brought $62,400, a record price for both Vroman and the album. Linnaeus Tripe's album, Photographs of the Elliot Marbles, which can be read about here, brought $57,600.

Alfred Eisenstaedt, Children at Puppet Theatre, Paris, silver print, 1963, printed 1991. Copyright Time Inc. Sold for $48,000.


The day's top selling photograph was Alfred Eisenstaedt's Children at Puppet Theater, 1963, which sold for $48,000.
 
Also, via Swann's Twitter: "Bert Stern's unique contact sheet of Marilyn Monroe sold yesterday at Swann's Fine Photographs auction for a record $22,800"
 
Related: Born December 6: Alfred Eisenstaedt

5OTH ANNIVERSARY OF THE INAGURATION OF JOHN. F. KENNEDY

Alfred Eisenstaedt: President John F.Kennedy with his wife, Jacqueline, and Vice-President Lyndon B. Johnson at inaugural celebration, Mayflower Hotel, Washington, DC, January 20, 1961



50 years ago, John F. Kennedy began his inaguration speech at 12:51 Friday, 20 January 1961, immediately after taking the presidential oath of office. It included the memorable line:

"Ask not what your country can do for you - ask what you can do for your country"

More: John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum

BORN DECEMBER 6: ALFRED EISENSTAEDT


We celebrate and remember Alfred Eisenstaedt on the 112th anniversary of his birth. We were privileged to have first met Eisie in 1986, and he inspired and informed our path as gallerists specializing in photojournalism.

Renowned as the father of modern photojournalism, Alfred Eisenstaedt’s career as a preeminent photojournalist spanned eight decades. Born in West Prussia on December 6, 1898, “Eisie”, as he preferred to be called, began taking photographs in Germany in 1914. As a pioneer in his field, “Eisie” had few rules to follow. Diminutive in stature, he worked with minimal equipment and was known for an aggressive yet invisible style of working. Regarded as an innovator of available light photography, Eisenstaedt dispensed with flash photography early on in order to preserve the ambiance of natural lighting.

He photographed throughout Europe, Africa, and the Middle East until he came to LIFE magazine in 1936. As one of the four original staff photographers for LIFE, “Eisie” covered over 2,500 assignments and created 86 covers for the magazine. Acknowledged as one of the most published photojournalists in the world, he took photographs at the first meeting of Hitler and Mussolini, of Albert Einstein teaching at Princeton, Churchill’s campaign and re-election, children at a puppet theater in Paris, Marilyn Monroe at home, and hundreds of other significant people and events around the world. He was an editor’s dream, and his work had what became known as “Eisie’s eye”. Portrait assignments became one of  his specialties, and in the process he accumulated many little-known secrets about his subjects.

“V-J Day, Times Square, 1945”, in which a sailor, elated because the war is over, kisses a nurse amidst a New York crowd, will perhaps always be Alfred Eisenstaedt’s signature photograph. Acclaimed as one of the Ten Greatest Images of Photojournalism, it reflects “Eisie’s” keen sense of spontaneity. Many books have been written about Eisenstaedt and his career; and he authored several books including: People, Witness To Our Time, Eisenstaedt On Eisenstaedt, and Remembrances. It is unlikely that anyone could have lived during the last 50 years without having been exposed to the photographs of Alfred Eisenstaedt. “Eisie” worked almost ceaselessly until his death in 1995, even photographing President Clinton and Family in 1993.

Alfred Eisenstaedt possessed the unique talent to capture a story in a single, tell-all moment. The photographer’s job, he once wrote, “is to find and catch the storytelling moment.” “Eisie” received awards and recognition far too numerous to list. His photographs have been exhibited in prestigious museums and galleries throughout the world and are in the permanent collections of many important art institutions.

Accolades continued after his death. The Graduate School of Journalism at Columbia University inaugurated the Alfred Eisenstaedt Awards for Photography. The City of New York renamed Grand Street “Alfred Eisenstaedt Place” for the occasion of a retrospective exhibition organized by Sidney S. Monroe in 1998/1999. And in December, 1999 the on-line magazine Digital Journalist named Eisenstaedt “The Photojournalist of the Century”. The career of this legendary photographer was celebrated with the exhibition “The Eye of Eisenstaedt” at Monroe Gallery July 7 – October 1, 2006.


Alfred Eisenstaedt passed away on August 25, 1995 - just 11 days after the 50th anniversary of his iconic photography "VJ-Day in Times Square".  His obituary in The New York Times was titled "Alfred Eisenstaedt, Photographer of the Defining Moment, Is Dead at 96".



Related: Alfred Eisenstaedt Master Photographer, 1983 BBC series on YouTube

New Yorker Magazine: Photo Booth: Alfred Eisenstaedt’s Century in Photographs

In March, 2010, Sidney and Michelle Monroe received the Alfred Eisenstaedt Award for Excellence in Photography "for their passion and dedication to the LIFE photographers".

VJ-DAY, TIMES SQUARE, NEW YORK, AUGUST 14, 1945

The V-J Day picture of the white-clad nurse by photographer Alfred Eisenstaedt captured an epic moment in U.S. history and became an iconic image marking the end of the war after being published in Life magazine.

It is probably the most iconographic image associated with LIFE, photojournalism, and World War II. Eisenstaedt recounts how he got the shot: “I was walking through the crowds on V-J Day, looking for pictures. I noticed a sailor coming my way. He was grabbing every female he could find and kissing them all – young girls and old ladies alike… The sailor came along, grabbed the nurse, and bent down to kiss her. Now if this girl hadn’t been a nurse, if she’d been dressed in dark clothes, I wouldn’t have had a picture. People tell me that when I’m in heaven, they will remember this picture.”


Related: THEN AND NOW: VJ-Day and the death of Osama bin Laden