André Kertész @ Foam

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André Kertész @ Foam

July 15th, 2017 by fstop

Nageur sous l’eau, Esztergom, Hongrie, 1917 © André Kertész
Ministère de la Culture et de la Communication / Médiathèque de l’architecture et du patrimoine, Dist Rmn © Donation André Kertész

André Kertész – Mirroring Life
15 September – 6 December 2017

“Anonymous flâneur
At a very early age André Kertész was drawn to the photography he saw in illustrated magazines as a child. In 1912, after his study in Business Administration, he bought his first camera from his first pay cheque. His hobby quickly gained the upper hand. He photographed farmers, gypsies and landscapes and made playful compositions featuring his brothers as extras. Even when he was called into the army in 1914, he took his camera with him. However, the photographs he took during the war sooner resemble a personal diary than a news report. In 1925, he left Hungary and moved to Paris. More than other photographers of his time, such as Jacques Henri Lartigue, who focused on his own flamboyant lifestyle, or Brassaï, who voyeuristically captured the cabarets and forbidden temptations of nocturnal Paris, Kertész worked as an anonymous flâneur. He observed the city, taking in its cafés and parks, or simply looked out of the window of his flat. He photographed his artist friends, shop windows, posters and symbols on the street, shadows cast by trees, passers-by, children playing, a pair of glasses laying on a table – simple things, but always captured from a unique perspective, through which he found poetry in the mundane.”

Foam
Keizersgracht 609
1017 DS Amsterdam

Location: Amsterdam, Netherlands Type: Exhibition

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