Horst P. Horst, Irving Penn, Lee Miller, Edward Steichen, André Kertész: star photographers of the 20th century whose pictures have made history. More than 400 are united in Venice in the Palazzo Grassi. They come from the vast photography collection acquired by French art collector and billionaire François Pinault. They can now be seen for the first time in the Italian lagoon city.
The photographic prints were once part of the legendary archive of glossy publisher Condé Nast, which owns titles such as Vogue and Vanity Fair. According to Matthieu Humery, curator of the show, which runs until January 7, 2024, and advisor to the Pinault Collection photo collection, the art collector is said to have acquired several thousand.
What is shown in Venice is only a small part of the Condé acquisition, said the art historian of the German Press Agency. This expands the Pinault collection, which is already rich in photographs and historical names.
The recordings come from 185 different photographers. They show actors, writers, politicians, models and artists – photographed between 1910 and 1979 by the best of the best. Movie stars like Sophie Loren and Warren Beatty and artists like Pablo Picasso and Fernand Léger join the list of portraits.
There is also a recording of the German sculptor Renée Sintenis. It comes from the Berlin photographer Steffi Brandl. Sintenis mainly created animal sculptures. One of the best known is the little bear, which has been awarded in gold and silver at the Berlinale since the early 1950s. (dpa)