Equipped with his camera, Brassaï (1899-1984) captured the traces and inscriptions of ordinary citizens in the streets of Paris in the early 1930s. Through this practice he immortalised their drawings and discovered a self-expression that is hidden away and unexpected but also omnipresent. In his search for representations of real internal life - which he captured in his spontaneous photographs of urban life, the best-known being his series of night shots entitled Paris de Nuit - Brassaï discovered graffiti.
He was fascinated by this phenomenon, which reflects an irresistible and existential need to inscribe one's presence in matter, to immortalise our wounds and our best hopes. In his photographs of - shrunken, deformed and collapsed, wrinkled and cracked - figures, animals and faces, Brassaϊ illustrates the fascinating and magical aspects of these primitive forms of expression. According to him, they successfully question the purpose of mankind, nature and the meaning of life and death while at the same time inviting an encounter with the unknown.
Publications
Works
Exhibitions
Hôtel de Ville de Paris, Paris, France; Palazzo Morando, Milan, Italy; Palazzo Ducale, Genoa, Italy
Galerie Karsten Greve, Paris, France
Museu Oscar Niemeyer, Curitiba, Brazil
Museum Berggruen, Berlin, Germany
Galerie Karsten Greve, Cologne, Germany
Circulo de Bellas Artes, Madrid, Spain
Martin-Gropius-Bau, Berlin, Germany
Tokyo Metropolitan Museum of Photography, Tokyo, Japan
Boca Raton Museum of Art, Boca Raton, USA
Louisiana Museum of Modern Art, Humlebæk, Denmark
Kunstmuseum Wolfsburg, Germany
Hayward Gallery, London, UK
Albertina, Vienna, Austria
Ludwig Museum of Contemporary Art, Budapest, Hungary
The National Gallery of Art, Washington D.C., USA
Centre Georges Pompidou - Musée National d’Art Moderne, Paris, France
Fundación Antoni Tàpies, Barcelona, Spain
MoMA – The Museum of Modern Art, New York, USA
The Corcoran Gallery of Art, Washington D.C., USA
MoMA – The Museum of Modern Art, New York, USA
Historisches Museum, Frankfurt, Germany
Kunstverein, Hanover, Germany
Kunsthalle Baden-Baden, Germany
Triennale di Milano, Milan, Italy
Institute of Contemporary Arts, London, UK
selected by Edward Steichen, The Museum of Modern Art, New York, USA
Kunstmuseum Wolfsburg, Germany
Zeit-Foto Salon, Tokyo, Japan
Museo Picasso Málaga, Málaga, Spain
The Israel Museum, Jerusalem, Israel
Kunsthaus Zürich, Zurich, Switzerland
ZKM Zentrum für Kunst und Medientechnologie, Karlsruhe, Germany
Tokyo Metropolitan Museum of Photography, Tokyo, Japan
Deichtorhallen Hamburg, Germany
Laurence Miller Gallery, New York, USA
Tokyo Metropolitan Museum of Photography, Tokyo, Japan
International Center of Photography, New York, USA