Lot n° 92
Estimation :
8000 - 10000
EUR
Result with fees
Result
: 84 500EUR
MAN RAY (1890-1976)
Lee Miller, circa 1929
Gelatin silver print, solarization, circa 1960 81.5 x 61.5 cm
(Small tear on right edge)
Lee Miller, circa 1929
Gelatin silver print, solarization, circa 1960 32.09 x 24.22 inch.
(Small tear on right edge)
Note :
Our sale presents some very rare prints made by Man Ray between 1960 and 1962, on the occasion of the Photokina and his exhibition at the Bibliothèque
Nationale in Paris. Exceptional in size and quality, this print is unique.
In 1929, a beautiful American woman showed up on rue Campagne-Première: Lee Miller was a model at the time (she had posed for Edward Steichen in Vogue), and wanted to learn photography. Man Ray hired her as an assistant, but she quickly became more than that: at once model, muse and lover, their common adventure led them until 1931, when Lee Miller emancipated herself from her master to open her own studio.
The work of Man Ray's assistants (and there were many of them: Jacques-André Boiffard and Berenice Abbott are the best known and will also be presented in the sale) consisted mainly of preparing the studio before the appointment for a portrait, but they also carried out all the work in the darkroom, particularly the development of contacts.
It was precisely during a darkroom session that Lee Miller discovered solarization. In a letter to her brother Eric in 1929, she recounts: "Something touched my leg... I screamed and suddenly turned on the light. I did not discover what it was, a mouse perhaps. But I realized that the film had been exposed. In the developer tray were a dozen developed negatives of a nude on a black background. Man Ray grabbed them, dipped them into the hyposulfite tray and looked. The unexposed part of the negative - the black background - had, under the effect of the light of the lamp, been changed right up to the edge of the naked, white body." This laboratory accident would thus be the origin of the discovery of solarization, which constitutes a decisive moment in Man Ray's career. He managed to master this technique (known to photographers as the Sabatier effect), which he practiced mainly on negatives at the risk of losing them, but with the aim of being able to work on the image like any other, by retouching or cropping it. He made it a style, which became his signature. The characteristic border that forms around the subject gives it an uncommon, almost unreal aura, while bringing the photograph closer to the ingresco drawing, giving it one of its characteristics: the line.
This technique made Man Ray's portrait studio a success in the 1930s.
Our sale presents some very rare prints made by Man Ray between 1960 and 1962, on the occasion of the Photokina and his exhibition at the Bibliothèque
Nationale in Paris. Exceptional in size and quality, this print is unique.
In 1929, a beautiful American woman showed up on rue Campagne-Première: Lee Miller was a model at the time (she had posed for Edward Steichen in Vogue), and wanted to learn photography. Man Ray hired her as an assistant, but she quickly became more than that: at once model, muse and lover, their collaboration continued until 1931, when Lee Miller emancipated herself from her master to open her own studio.
The work of Man Ray's assistants (and there were many of them: Jacques-André Boiffard and Berenice Abbott are the best known and will also be presented in the sale) consisted mainly of preparing the studio before the appointment for a portrait, but they also carried out all the work in the darkroom, particularly the development of contact sheets.
It was during a darkroom session that Lee Miller discovered solarization. In a letter to her brother Eric in 1929, she recounts: "Something touched my leg... I screamed and suddenly turned on the light. I did not discover what it was, a mouse perhaps. But I realized that the film had been exposed. In the developing tray were a dozen developed negatives of a nude on a black background. Man Ray grabbed them, dipped them into the hyposulfite tray and looked. The unexposed part of the negative - the black background - had, under the effect of the light of the lamp, been modified right up to the edge of the naked, white body." This laboratory accident is therefore at the origin of the discovery of solarization, which constitutes a decisive moment in the career of Man Ray. He mastered this technique (known to photographers as the Sabatier effect), which he used mainly on negatives at the risk of losing them, but with the aim of being able to work on the image like any other, by retouching it or cropping it. He made it a style, which became his signature. The characteristic border that forms around the subject gives it an uncommon, almost unreal aura, while bringing the photog
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