"ONE OF THE ICONIC PHOTOGRAPHERS OF THE MID-TWENTIETH CENTURY"
LEITER, Saul. Photograph: Untitled. ("Snow"). New York, 1960, but printed later. Fujicolor Crystal Archive print, signed in ink on print verso. Image measures 13-1/2 by 9 inches, print measures14 by 11 inches; handsomely framed, entire piece measures 21-3/4 by 17-1/2 inches. $18,000.
Original color photograph signed by Saul Leiter, one of the masters of mid-twentieth century photography.
"The American artist Saul Leiter (1923–2013) became enchanted by painting and photography as a teenager in Pittsburgh. After he relocated to New York City in 1946, his visionary imagination and tireless devotion to artistic practice pushed him to become one of the iconic photographers of the mid-twentieth century. An innate sense of curiosity made him a lifelong student of art of all kinds, and he retained his spirit of exploration and spontaneity throughout his long career, in both his fashion images and his personal work. Leiter began experimenting with color photography in New York in the late 1940s, using slide film such as Kodachrome. The 2006 release of his first monograph, Early Color, revealed radically innovative compositions and a groundbreaking mastery of color that permanently changed the history of photography. Though Leiter sometimes defended the use of color in fine-art photography, he refused to analyze or explain his own work. 'I don't have a philosophy,' Leiter said. 'I have a camera.'" (Saul Leiter Foundation).
"Saul Leiter, American painter and photographer, was part of what was known as the New York school of photography of the 1940s and 50s, and resided on East 10th Street between 2nd and 3rd Avenues for 61 years until his death in 2013. His photographs from the 1950s experimented with color, unlike those of his contemporaries, and many were street scenes of his East Village neighborhood. Also unlike many of his contemporaries, the significance of this work has only recently come to be recognized and he is now duly credited as an early pioneer of color photography. The son of a well-known Talmudic scholar and rabbi, Saul Leiter was born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania on December 3, 1923, and expected to follow in his father's footsteps. Much to his family's dismay, he left religious school at the age of 23 and went to New York City to pursue painting. While at art school he befriended abstract-expressionist painter Richard Pousette-Dart, who encouraged Leiter's experiments with photography. He also became acquainted with photographer W. Eugene Smith, who would introduce him to members of what would be known as the New York school of photography, and included such noted photographers as Diane Arbus, Robert Frank, William Klein, and Richard Avedon. Leiter had begun to experiment with color photography by 1948, using an inexpensive 35mm camera and film which was sometimes past its date of expiration. The main subjects during this time in the 1950s were his friends and street scenes, mostly in the East Village. He said that he was especially fond of photographing First Avenue due to the lighting along the thoroughfare as a result of the low buildings. His plays with focus, light, form, reflection, and composition generated an innovative and painterly quality to his work, which makes his photos stand out from those of his contemporaries" (Sarah Bean Apmann). Provenance: from Howard Greenberg Gallery.
Fine condition.