Return to story

'Streets' focuses on photography

November 2, 2006 12:50 am

By SHEILA WICKOUSKI

For THE FREE LANCE-STAR

When an exhibit focuses on particular people in a specific time period in a certain place, pronouncements of the importance of the choice tend to follow. The National Gallery of Art has avoided that in its presentation from its permanent collection, "The Streets of New York City: American Photos From the Collection: 1938 to 1958."

The premise is that photography until that point in time had used conventional techniques of clear, posed pictures, and that two men, Alexey Brodovitch and Sid Grossman, challenged that convention in their experimental use of available light, blurred images and multiple exposures.

Brodovitch, art director of Harper's Bazaar, went with fashion, while Grossman was a liberal intellectual dedicated to social and political change. The men shared an interest in how to capture in photographic works the transitory nature of modern life, and in the process influenced dozens of new artists.

Two dates set the exhibit's parameters: 1938, when Walker Evans published "American Photographs," and 1958, when Robert Frank published "The Americans."

With only this much explanation, viewers are on their own to explore and to develop their own ideas about the exhibit.

Evans was daring not only in his methods but also in his means. He began his subway portraits in 1938, and for three years he used a 35 mm camera hidden under his coat to collect portraits of people in their most unaware moments. Since he could not adjust focus or exposure using this method, the subway riders appeared in a kind of "naked response," innocent of the fact that they were being captured on film.

Photography on the subway was banned even then, and while Evans was not alone in putting forth this type of photographic effort, the works in this particular series, which was not published until 1966, are icons. Evans has been praised for the raw energy of his works, which suggest the unawareness of wild animals with no concept of themselves as subjects. But he also has been criticized for his stalking approach and for invading his subjects' privacy.

Helen Levitt worked with Evans at the time, but she developed a more lyrical style, focusing on groups of children at play. There is a tenderness in her black-and-white photos, especially in one of a young girl dressed shabbily and holding a white flower.

In contrast, William Klein's photographs, such as "Boy + Gun + Girl, New York" (1955), in which a boy points a gun at the camera, is a startling juxtaposition of innocence and aggression.

Candid, not posed, sometimes out of focus or off-kilter, these studies were sometimes poignant. Roy De Carava's study of African-American life, in which luxurious shades of black are translated onto black-and-white film, is a case in point. His "Hallway" is a photograph of a shabby path through a tenement building, shrouded in darkness except for the light from a single naked bulb.

Sometimes, photographers shot works that celebrated the vibrancy of the city. Paul Himmel thought like a choreographer, shooting the movement of ballet or the action around Grand Central Station. Ted Croner's "Times Square Montage" blazes with the intermingled lights of cars and marquees.

Sometimes the loneliness of the post-Depression years came through.

There are only two color photos in the show, both lyrical abstracts by Saul Leiter, who trained as a painter. His "Through Boards" shows a white car through a red and black wooden gap--a composition that seems to be more influenced by Mark Rothko than by any of the photographers in this show.

Missing from the exhibit is any mention of the turbulent events in the world during these two decades. But that, in a way, is the point.

Events certainly change the world, but artists can change the way we respond to it.

The photographers, working as experimenters and artists, were not just recording events to inform the viewer. They were going deeper by creating images to evoke genuine responses--of humor or horror, delight or repulsion--as if the viewer had actually been there.