+drtikol/ Not such Sad News


Judy Seigel (jseigel@panix.com)
Mon, 01 Feb 1999 23:14:58 -0500 (EST)


On Mon, 1 Feb 1999, Carl Weese wrote:

> Judy Seigel wrote:
> >
> > Except that Cartier Bresson was one of the ones -- along with Strand,
> > Lartigue, and many others -- who LEFT photography in later life for
> > drawing and painting.
>
> True of Cartier Beresson, but not Strand who photographed steadily right
> to the end of his long life, though he did take a detour into
> documentary film in the middle of his career. While dying Strand was
> busy supervising the printing (by Chip Benson) of select portfolios of
> his life work and still making still life studies in his house and
> garden.---Carl>

I forgot to mention Drtikol, who in the early 1930s abandoned photography
"only to waste his talents on atavist and symbolist painting" for the rest
of his life. The quote is from Zdenek Primus, "Photographie Progressive en
Tchecoslovaqie 1920-1990," Vandoeuvre-les-Nancy, 1990, courtesy of Klaus
Pollmeier in the intro to his saga of the Drtikol Reprints (P-F, #2).

In view of the fact that those Drtikol paintings I've seen reproduced
looked perfectly stunning to me, I find that an ..... *interesting*
judgement.

As for Paul Strand -- I have that info at 2nd or 3rd hand, needless to
say. But it's been in print, possibly in the catalog or wallnotes of a
long-ago Strand show. In any event, I promise I didn't invent it. The
report was that he was living in France, painting and drawing. Maybe it
was greatly exaggerated.

Judy



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