| | | |  | | | Lillian Bassman
Dorian Leigh, for Harper's Bazaar, 1948
© The Estate of Lillian Bassman, Courtesy Staley-Wise Gallery, New York | | | MBAL Summer shows | | | | Between Art and Fashion - Photographs Collection of Carla Sozzani | | | | | | | | | | | | Photobook - The Cult of the Book | | | | 18 June – 15 October, 2017 | | |  | | | Musée des beaux-arts Marie-Anne-Calame 6, CH-2400 Le Locle
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Wed-Fri 12:30pm-5pm, Sat-Tue 11am-5pm |  |
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| | | | | | | | | |  | | | Erwin Blumenfeld
Le Décolleté, Victoria von Hagen, for Vogue, New York, 1952
© The Estate of Erwin Blumenfeld | | | | Between Art and Fashion - Photographs from the Collection of Carla Sozzani | | | | | | | 18 June – 15 October, 2017 | | | | It is rare for a museum to dedicate an exhibition to a private collection. Generally, it is a matter of borrowing a work of art here or there, and discretely indicating the name of the generous lender if the latter does not wish to remain anonymous. With this exhibition, Carla Sozzani, a legendary figure of contemporary elegance, welcomes us into her intimate space. Her collection of photographs, which covers the 20th and 21st centuries, is remarkable in all respects. More than 70 photographs are represented among the 200 prints selected by Fabrice Hergott, director of the Musée d’Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris. We find in the show some of the greatest names – Richard Avedon, Horst P. Horst, William Klein, Man Ray, László Moholy-Nagy, Don McCullin, Daido Moriyama, Helmut Newton, Irving Penn, Paolo Roversi, Alfred Stieglitz – and numerous female photographers such as Berenice Abbott, Lillian Bassman, Louise Dahl-Wolfe, Dominique Issermann, Sheila Metzner, Sarah Moon, Leni Riefenstahl and Francesca Woodman. | | | | | |  | | | Horst P. Horst
Hands, Hands… New York, 1941
© Horst P. Horst / Condé Nast | | | | | | | Photography nourished Carla Sozzani from the very beginning of her career, and her collection was enriched over the course of many encounters and several years. Playing a fundamental role in fashion since the early 1970s, Carla Sozzani collaborated with numerous photographers while she was editor in chief of special editions of Vogue Italia, and continued to do so after she founded Italian ELLE. Known for her sharp eye and her aesthetic sense, she participates in the journeys of numerous creators. In 1990, she founded the Galleria Carla Sozzani in Milan, where she mainly exhibits photography. Then, the following year, she founded 10 Corso Como, the very first concept store, which has since then been deployed in Seoul, Shanghai, Peking, and will soon open in New York. The richness of this collection unveils an intelligent, sensitive, cultivated, persevering, and beauty-loving personality. We find in it many icons but also images that are unknown, unusual, and that awe us. This exceptional exhibition was born of the will of couturier Azzedine Alaïa, who belongs to Carla Sozzani’s intimate circle, and who presented this collection in her Parisian gallery last winter. | | | | | |  | | | Helmut Newton
Self-Portrait with Wife and Models, Paris, 1980
© The Helmut Newton Foundation | | | | | | | The exhibition is organized in collaboration with the Fondazione Sozzani, Milan, and is accompanied by a publication, available in French and English. | | | | | | |
| | | | | | | | | |  | | | © Henry Leutwyler
James Dean's key to the room 82 of the Iroquois Hotel, New York, James Dean residence
From the series Document, 2015 | | | | | | | 18 June – 15 October, 2017 | | | | Celebrity photography is a genre that never runs out of steam. Portraits of movie stars, artists, statesmen, musicians, athletes… glossy magazines know that success is assured when photography prompts us to dream. Henry Leutwyler (b.1961), a New York photographer of Swiss origins, knows something about this – he who has made portraits of celebrities like Julia Roberts, Michelle Obama or Rihanna, and who works for such prestigious magazines as Vanity Fair, New York Times Magazine, Esquire, Vogue or Time. | | | | | |  | | | © Henry Leutwyler
John Lennon's (1940 - 1980) gold wire-rimmed sunglasses with blue lenses
From the series Document, 2007 | | | | | | | A product of 12 years of discoveries, the series Document presents itself like a portrait gallery of objects that belonged to celebrities that Leutwyler would have been able to photograph had he been born but a few years earlier! Gandhi’s pocket watch, John Lennon’s glasses (and the weapon that killed him), Andy Warhol’s paintbrush, Mohamed Ali’s boxing shoe, Michael Jackson’s glove, Jimi Hendrix’s guitar, Elvis Presley’s wallet, or James Dean’s hotel room key… Isolated from their contexts and their owners, these objects – icons of the modern world – capture our attention. Authentic and worn, they are material witnesses of their owners, veritable relics of these celebrities as well as a projection of our own collective memory. These still lifes invite us into intimacy with celebrities in unprecedented ways. Leutwyler prompts us to reread history differently, with all the unexpected emotional charge that this collection of singular objects entails. | | | | | |  | | | © Henry Leutwyler
Alfred Hitchcock’s (1899 - 1980) last British passport before he became a United States citizen in 1955
From the series Document, 2007 | | | | | |  | | | © Henry Leutwyler
Charlie Chaplin’s (1889 - 1977) cane
From the series Document, 2013 | | | | | |  | | | © Henry Leutwyler
Bob Dylan's (b. 1941) M. Hohner Marine Band Harmonica - serial number A449
From the series Document, 2017 | | | | | | | The exhibition is organized in collaboration with Foley Gallery, New York, and has received support from Laumont Photographics and Zenith Swiss Watches. It is accompanied by a book published by Steidl and a limited edition, signed and numbered, puzzle produced by MBAL. | | | | | | |
| | | | | | | | | |  | | | © Ina Jang
Watermelon. From the series Utopia, 2017
Courtesy Christophe Guye Galerie | | | | | | | 18 June – 15 October, 2017 | | | | Ina Jang (b.1982), a South Korean artist based in New York, is invited to exhibit her latest project. Through her new series she explores the theme of feminine identity with reference to the fashion image that she also cultivates in her work. Made from images found on Japanese magazine websites, the Utopia series features silhouettes of female bodies in suggestive poses. The artist did not modify the poses or the hair, but we find her signature in the technique of collage and the color treatment. | | | | | |  | | | © Ina Jang
Bubblegum, from the series Utopia, 2016
Courtesy Christophe Guye Galerie | | | | | | | With Utopia, Ina Jang questions the stereotypes tied to the representation of the female body. Her singular photographic language allows us to divine an oneiric universe, where play on perceptions, textures, and forms are fundamental. Her catalogue of silhouettes offers up the gaze of a young artist of the 21st century who seizes the female nude, a genre with a long tradition dating back to painting that has been valued by photographers since the invention of the medium in the 19th century. | | | | | |  | | | © Ina Jang
Lemonade, from the series Utopia, 2016
Courtesy Christophe Guye Galerie | | | | | | | Ina Jang is represented by Christophe Guye Galerie in Zurich. On the occasion of the exhibition, MBAL is publishing an interview with the artist, the fourth issue of the series « Could you talk about… ». | | | | | | |
| | | | | | | | | |  | | | © Viviane Sassen
The artist's personal library, 2017 | | | Photobook - The Cult of the Book | | | | 18 June – 15 October, 2017 | | | The Photobook show inscribes itself in the wake of L’art se livre, a 2014 exhibition dedicated to art and artists’ books. In the framework of this photographic season, the museum focuses on the cult of the photography book, a phenomenon more current than ever. Since the early 1990s, the number of publishers interested in photography has not stopped growing, while digital technologies have placed editing tools directly in the hands of photographers. As much at the level of its content as of its form, the photobook is now venturing in directions that would have been inconceivable 15 or 20 years ago. As for its distribution, it has found new networks through the internet, new publishing houses, and various specialized exhibitions. For photographers – of all generations – publishing a book is like having a passport for the international scene.
Whether hand made or resulting from the latest technologies, a book is the result of decisions that do not change over time: choice of visual and textual content, cover, format, layout, paper, binding, type of printing, etc. These different elements must articulate themselves coherently. Published by large publishing houses or at the author’s own expense, printed by the thousands or in limited edition, the photography book is also a collector’s item for photographers, who are themselves assiduous buyers of photobooks. Sixteen photographers have thus agreed to reveal a few glimpses of their personal library. The exhibition, realized in collaboration with Darius Himes, International Head of the Photographs department at Christie’s, and co-author of the book « Publish your Photography Book », proposes to pay homage to the photobook.
To celebrate the cult of the photography book, MBAL brings together after Paris, New York, Madrid, Düsseldorf, and Moscow the books selected in the shortlist of the Paris Photo-Aperture Foundation PhotoBook Awards, a competition organized annually by Aperture and Paris Photo, two important actors of the international photography scene. 35 books, chosen by a jury of specialists out of 952 recent books from 63 countries, were divided into three categories: First Photobook, Photobook of the Year, and Photography Catalogue of the Year. The winners of all three categories are announced in the exhibition. |
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