SHADOWS AND SUBSTANCE presents a selection of 67 Brandt’s works. All are the original vintage prints - quite significant as Brandt changed the way he made prints, later on in his life, often reworking older images.
He was influenced by Man Ray and Edward Weston who represented two movements in photography of the times – documentary and poetic. These trends seem to have both merged in Brandt’s work – he took pictures of London nightlife but carefully staged them to suggest narratives.
For ten years, he worked as freelance photographer, highlighting the differences between classes, capturing lives of families in the industrial North and London streets at the end of the war. After the WWII, he moved from documentary photography to nudes and landscapes.
Ohio, USA
Bill Brandt, Shadows and Substance
Until 24 August 2008
Akron Art Museum
www.akronartmuseum.org
Bill Brandt, Young Housewife, Bethnal Green 1937. Bill Brandt Archive Ltd
