Currently on view at Lumière

Andre Kertesz • Berenice Abbott • Le Corbusier (Richard Pare) • David Hayes

This exhibition features four 20th Century artists for whom France was an important influence. It also tells a story of the emergence of new artistic styles, featuring work by three who migrated to Paris between 1917 and 1925 and one who came to France later in the Century.

Chez Mondrian, 1927

This exhibition features four 20th Century artists for whom France was an important influence.

It also tells a story of the emergence of new artistic styles, featuring work by three who migrated to Paris between 1917 and 1925 and one who came to France later in the Century.

Le Corbusier, Andre Kertesz and Berenice Abbott were all largely self taught artists from Switzerland, Hungary and America arriving in Paris when it was the art capital of the world – and established the foundations for their reputations there. The fourth, Hayes, came as a Fulbright Scholar and Guggenheim Fellow. He was greatly influenced by the traditions of the 20’s by David Smith and Alexander Calder.

The architect and painter Corbusier’s work is illustrated by Richard Pare – one of the twentieth century’s most notable architectural photographers – who is currently completing a major project with the Foundation Le Corbusier. It covers the architect’s creations around the world, including 17 buildings in 7 countries designated as UNESCO World Heritage Sites.

Kertesz, whose Paris “postcard photographs” made a major contribution to modernism, was influenced by Piet Mondrian. His images often reflect simplified geometric forms… in contrast with pictorialism in vogue at the time. Photographs in the exhibition include small format images from Paris, as well as ones from his early days in Hungary. Kertesz left Paris for New York in 1937; Mondrian also left, first to London , then to New York in 1940.

Abbott, mentored by Man Ray, became a highly successful portrait photographer, especially among Paris’ artistic community. Introduced to Eugène Atget by Man Ray, she worked actively to preserve his legacy as the recorder of Paris’ architecture. Returning to America in 1929, Abbott initiated her own decade long project photographing the architecture and people of New York…that became the widely acclaimed series, “Changing New York”.

David Hayes’ abstract steel sculptures based on organic forms reflect his early training with sculptor David Smith. Smith, at the Art Students League in New York, was introduced to the work of the modernist movement through Mondrian’s paintings and Picasso’s welded steel sculptures. This was passed on to Hayes. Following early acceptance of Hayes work at the Museum of Modern Art and Guggenheim, he went to Paris in 1965.

Featured in this exhibition is the work of four artists highlighted below.

Select the image below to view the complete artist page for these photographers.

Andres Kertesz

Berenice Abbott

Berenice Abbott (1898 – 1991) American photographer Berenice Abbott was born in Springfield Ohio in 1898 and died in retirement in Monson, Maine in 1991. Except for a formative and influential decade in Paris in the 1920s, she spent most of her productive life in photography in New York City. Her five decades of accomplishments behind the camera range from portraiture and modernist experimentation to documentation and scientific interpretation. Her contributions as photographic educator, inventor, author and historian are equally diverse: she originated the photography program at the New School for Social Research and taught there from 1934-58; wrote several books and numerous articles including the once influential Guide to Better Photography (1941); received four U.S. patents for photographic and other devices; and rescued the work of French master photographer Eugene Atget. Abbott’s photographs consistently reflect her innate appreciation for the profound documentary capacity of rigorously conceived images to impart information in an aesthetically engaging way.

Richard Pare

Richard Pare (1948 – ) In his early years he was a chorister at Canterbury Cathedral. Later he studied photography and graphic design in Winchester and at Ravensbourne College of Art before moving to the United States in 1971. In 1973 he graduated from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and since then he has been working as a photographer with a particular affinity for architecture. His most recent project is an ongoing study of the architecture of the Russian Avantgarde. In 1996 he published Tadao Ando. The Colours of Light which received the AIA monograph award. He was curator of the Seagram photography collection from 1974 until 1985. He was the founding curator for the photography collection of the Canadian Centre for Architecture from its inception in 1974 until he became a consultant to the collection in 1989 , a role he continues to fulfill. His works have been exhibited widely and he is represented in many of the major public collections of photography. He continues to write and lecture on the history of photography. His numerous seminal exhibitions and publications include Court House: A Photographic Document (1978) Photography and Architecture: 1839-1939 (1982), and The Lost Vanguard, Architecture of the Russian Avantgarde 1922-1932.

David Hayes

David Hayes (1931 – 2013) Hayes earned an M.F.A. degree from Indiana University in 1955 where he studied with David Smith. He received a post-doctoral Fulbright award and a Guggenheim Fellowship. A recipient of the Logan Prize for Sculpture, he was also given an award from the National Institute of Arts and Letters. Hayes draws his inspiration from forms and shapes found in nature. Over 300 exhibitions and more than 100 institutional collections have included his sculpture, including the Museum of Modern Art and the Guggenheim Museum in New York.