Poster Henry VIII, Paris
Photograph
1934 (made)
1934 (made)
Artist/Maker | |
Place of origin |
Ilse Bing (1899-1998) was one of several leading women photographers in the inter-war period. Born into a Jewish family in Frankfurt, she initially pursued an academic career before moving to Paris in 1930 to concentrate on photography.
Bing’s modernist vision was not restricted just to clean planes and geometrical structures. Paris presented a complex urban scene that was modern yet also worn and weathered. As with contemporary Surrealist townscapes, the past broke through. The modernisation of the urban fabric cast light on the battered remains of an older place – the exhausted pomp of the Père Lachaise cemetery, or dark apartment blocks reflected in gutters. Her best images of Paris are informed by a chaotic layering of signs of disregarded culture, like the wasted potted plants in her study of a pavement or the abject torn posters on a wooden fence.
Bing’s modernist vision was not restricted just to clean planes and geometrical structures. Paris presented a complex urban scene that was modern yet also worn and weathered. As with contemporary Surrealist townscapes, the past broke through. The modernisation of the urban fabric cast light on the battered remains of an older place – the exhausted pomp of the Père Lachaise cemetery, or dark apartment blocks reflected in gutters. Her best images of Paris are informed by a chaotic layering of signs of disregarded culture, like the wasted potted plants in her study of a pavement or the abject torn posters on a wooden fence.
Object details
Category | |
Object type | |
Title | Poster Henry VIII, Paris (generic title) |
Materials and techniques | Gelatin-silver print |
Brief description | 'Poster Henry VIII, Paris' photograph by Ilse Bing, 1934 |
Physical description | Black and white photograph of torn posters on a wooden fence, mounted on original work book sheet. |
Dimensions |
|
Style | |
Credit line | Bequeathed by Ilse Bing Wolff |
Production | Vintage print |
Subjects depicted | |
Place depicted | |
Summary | Ilse Bing (1899-1998) was one of several leading women photographers in the inter-war period. Born into a Jewish family in Frankfurt, she initially pursued an academic career before moving to Paris in 1930 to concentrate on photography. Bing’s modernist vision was not restricted just to clean planes and geometrical structures. Paris presented a complex urban scene that was modern yet also worn and weathered. As with contemporary Surrealist townscapes, the past broke through. The modernisation of the urban fabric cast light on the battered remains of an older place – the exhausted pomp of the Père Lachaise cemetery, or dark apartment blocks reflected in gutters. Her best images of Paris are informed by a chaotic layering of signs of disregarded culture, like the wasted potted plants in her study of a pavement or the abject torn posters on a wooden fence. |
Bibliographic reference | Kate Best and Sophie Leighton, 'Interwar Photography at the V&A: Modernism and More' in Apollo May 2006 |
Collection | |
Accession number | E.3025-2004 |
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Record created | August 4, 2004 |
Record URL |
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