Tell Me What You See Skrein Photo Collection
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Presse T +43 662 842220-601 F +43 662 842220-700 [email protected] www.museumdermoderne.at Friedrich Seidenstücker, Berlin, 1932, gelatin silver print © Skrein Photo Collection Tell Me What You See Skrein Photo Collection June 12–October 17, 2021 Mönchsberg [1] Information up to date as of June 10, 2021 1/12 MdMS Press Kit Tell Me What You See. Skrein Photo Collection Presse Introduction T +43 662 842220-601 F +43 662 842220-700 Christian Skrein [email protected] www.museumdermoderne.at The exhibition Tell Me What You See. Skrein Photo Collection is a tribute to the photographer and collector Christian Skrein (Vienna, AT, 1945). In the 1960s, a young Skrein embarked on a career as a photo reporter, then as an advertising and fashion photographer; later he felt drawn to the artists, designers, and architects of the young Viennese avant-garde. He was on the scene wherever the exciting new things that earned the “swinging sixties” their moniker were happening; in 1965, he photographed the Beatles on a film set in Obertauern and the Rolling Stones during their concert at Vienna’s Stadthalle. In 1966, Skrein opened a studio for fashion and advertising photography in Vienna, followed after a while by a second studio in Milan. Having equipped himself with first-rate photo gear, he placed work in prominent periodicals including Vogue. His repertoire encompassed photographic experiments, street photography, photo reportages, advertising and fashion photography, and artists’ portraits. Skrein was a fixture of the Austrian and international arts scenes and acquainted with Walter Pichler, Arnulf Rainer, Hans Hollein, Friedensreich Hundertwasser, and Oswald Wiener. For a brief period, he was a leading portraitist of the circle of avant-garde artists around Galerie nächst St. Stephan, the Wiener Gruppe, and Viennese Actionism; Christo and Joseph Beuys were also among his sitters. But then, in 1970, he abandoned his career as a photographer and put the camera aside to dedicate himself to producing and directing advertising films. The photographer Skrein now took a back seat to the impassioned collector. The Skrein Photo Collection The fruit of that passion, which has never waned in now more than five decades, is one of the world’s large collections of snapshot photography; in fact, the collection has arguably been a leader in the efforts to gather and present such pictures. Thematically varied, the collection boasts central icons of photographic history, with prints of Robert Capa’s Falling Soldier, Alfred Eisenstaedt’s famous kiss scene, and Henri Cartier-Bresson’s eunuch at the imperial court of the last Chinese dynasty, plus rare shots by Aenne Biermann, Ilse Bing, Walker Evans, Gisèle Freund, Dorothea Lange, Man Ray, August Sander, Edward Weston, and many other celebrated photographers. Another division of the collection that deserves special mention is the set of photographs from Cuba that Skrein and his wife Maria started compiling in the 1990s. Comprising around 4,500 pictures, it constitutes a singular visual conspectus of the events of the Cuban Revolution and the realities of life in Cuba between 1953 and 1968. 2/12 MdMS Press Kit Tell Me What You See. Skrein Photo Collection Presse The majority of the pictures in Maria and Christian Skrein’s collection date from between 1920 and 1970, but the holdings also include an abundance of T +43 662 842220-601 historic photographs from the nineteenth century. The exhibition Tell Me F +43 662 842220-700 What You See. Skrein Photo Collection and the accompanying publication [email protected] represent the first attempt to allow the public to see and experience the www.museumdermoderne.at enormous collection in all its diversity. The selection of over three hundred photographs grouped in twelve chapters seeks to limn the collectors’ profile and throw their approach, partialities, and expertise into relief. The chapters of the exhibition Tell Me What You See. Skrein Photo Collection The Collector as Photographer A guiding idea that runs through the collection presentation is that photographers are always also collectors of pictures. Before Christian Skrein took up collecting shots by other photographers, he was a producer of pictures in his own right, to which the exhibition’s opening chapter is dedicated. Among the exhibits are the cover of the rororo paperback first edition of Oswald Wiener’s Die Verbesserung von Mitteleuropa, based on a photograph by Skrein, and an exhibition poster featuring another of Skrein’s pictures that Arnulf Rainer overpainted. Vue d’en haut / Unexpected Prospects The second chapter examines a specific form of camera perspective: the view from above. Berenice Abbott’s view of New York at night, probably her best-known work, meets René Burri’s suggestive shot from São Paulo. We survey the war-ravaged Dresden with Richard Peter, and Giorgio Sommer takes us to Pompeii. Traces In a very fundamental way, photography may be regarded as a practice of preserving traces. The Skrein Collection contains a wealth of photographed details and clues that can explicitly serve as evidence, including an alleged Yeti footprint from 1951 and what is perhaps the most famous boot print of all times: the one Buzz Aldrin left on the moon in 1969, photographed by Neil Armstrong Formations When photographers try to capture diverse formations found in nature, composition is key—an important touchstone of artistic photography. Birds in flight are one such natural formation, though the photographer still needs to frame it; the collection has a strikingly early example of the motif from around 1880. Mario Giacomelli’s seminary students dancing in the snow seem to be following a secret choreography, as do the paper planes launched into the air during a rally led by Fidel Castro in a picture by Raúl Corrales. 3/12 MdMS Press Kit Tell Me What You See. Skrein Photo Collection The World of Things Presse How we look at and make sense of things has changed over the course of T +43 662 842220-601 the history of photography, as have the ways in which we interact with them. F +43 662 842220-700 The collection contains artifacts like the suit of armor in a photograph [email protected] Andreas Groll produced in 1851, the picture of a cow taken by Nadar jeune, www.museumdermoderne.at and Aenne Biermann’s shot of poppies. A mathematical object by Man Ray and Lucia Moholy’s fan in the living room of Walter Gropius’s master’s house in Dessau are additional evidence of the allure that objects have for us humans. Beautiful Defects Entire books have been written about how productive so-called mistakes in photography can be. Such blunders, which occasionally yield brilliant visual effects, happen to amateur photographers, but hardly only to them. Double exposures conjure spectral apparitions, while mirror reflections and shadows can make for positively hypnotizing images. In some instances, these mistakes are deliberate, a creative device; in others, felicitous coincidences. This chapter features extensive samples of all three variants. Shadow Plays Photography is unthinkable without the image of the shadow. Its phenomenology in the Skrein Photo Collection ranges from snapshots in which the photographer inadvertently included his own shadow in the frame to compositions in which the shadow is ingeniously orchestrated to compelling comedic or graphical effect. And then there is the photographic shadow image par excellence: the X-ray photograph. The Decisive Moment? Many photographs are ostensibly or actually documentary shots. They often show once-in-a-lifetime occurrences, coincidental constellations, unique physiognomies, or nuclei of crystallization in which historical developments emerge into view. More than a few such pictures that appeared to be snapshots later turned out to have been staged. The collection includes illustrious examples: from Eddie Adams and Robert Capa to Yevgeny Khaldei and Robert Lebeck. Goddesses and Gods No medium is better suited than photography to establishing intimacy with individuals who would seem to be forever beyond the audience’s reach. The circulation of iconic images simulates their accessibility. In this chapter, the Mexican goddess Coatlicue, captured by William Henry Jackson in 1890, meets pictures of Marilyn Monroe and Jayne Mansfield. The roster of featured stars also includes Frida Kahlo, portrayed by Gisèle Freund, and a number of male heroes such as Che Guevara, whom the Skrein Photo Collection has in famous as well as virtually unseen pictures. 4/12 MdMS Press Kit Tell Me What You See. Skrein Photo Collection Delightful Caprice Presse If “Goddesses and Gods” is already a category that sparks debate and T +43 662 842220-601 prompts suspicions of irony, the photographs gathered in this chapter might F +43 662 842220-700 very well have been included in the previous section: Lisette Model’s merry [email protected] bather at Coney Island is a fine example. www.museumdermoderne.at Local Color / Global Color Not unlike the portrait, travel photography has been a major field for photographers since the medium’s invention. The materials in the Skrein Collection let us probe various aspects, including the history of technical innovations. For example, the collection has the famous La Crevasse, taken by the Bisson brothers in 1862. Many of the works in this chapter convey lively glimpses behind the scenes and candid impressions, as in the empathetic photograph of a child by Edith Tudor-Hart, whom her brother called the “eye of conscience.” Photographers as Picture Collectors Like the entire exhibition, this chapter presents an undogmatic mix of portraits of famous photographers with pictures by amateurs. On display are the remake of Ilse Bing’s self-portrait that Abe Frajndlich made fifty-five years later; Andreas Feininger’s iconic shot of the photojournalist Dennis Stock, his eye obscured by the lens of his camera, which has been described as the quintessential twentieth-century photographer’s portrait; and, no less acclaimed, Umbo’s self-portrait.