Exhibition Review: "Modern Look: Photography and the American Magazine" at The Jewish Museum
Lillian Bassman, "A Report to Skeptics," Suzy Parker, April 1952, Harper's Bazaar. Gelatin silver print. Collection of Eric and Lizzie Himmel, New York © Estate of Lillian Bassman
Written by Andy Dion
In the early 1930s, the threat of war and the rising power of the Nazi regime loomed over Germany, forcing a widespread emigration of practitioners of budding modern and avant-garde art movements. In fleeing an institution that harshly persecuted nontraditional art forms, artists were given a new lease on not only their crafts, but their lives. Modern Look is an exhibition currently on display at the Jewish Museum that tracks the revolution in design and photography as purveyed by Jewish emigres in magazines of the time, such as Harper’s Bazaar and Life. This period saw a renaissance of design in the visual zeitgeist, seen in widely publicized magazines led by Alexander Liberman and Alexey Brodovitch.
After setting foot on American soil, artists were met with a swath of prominent magazines that would circulate burgeoning new artists and visual styles. This egalitarian approach allowed photographers, designers, and art directors to sail into uncharted territories. Modern Look exemplifies just how pervasive photography was at the time. The magazine format, requiring both visual flair and a utility with the potential capacity to boost a struggling economy, was (and still is) a setting that encourages stellar design choices.
Gordon Parks, Portrait of Helen Frankenthaler, photographed for Life Magazine, May 13, 1957, printed 2018 Archival pigment print. The Jewish Museum, NY, Purchase: Horace W. Goldsmith Foundation Fund, 2018-75
Artwork © The Gordon Parks Foundation
Ringl + Pit (Grete Stern and Ellen Auerbach) Komol Haircoloring, 1932, printed 1985. Gelatin silver print. The Jewish Museum, NY, Purchase: Horace W. Goldsmith Foundation Fund. Artwork © ringl+pit, courtesy Robert Mann Gallery, New York
More than ever before, artists working for these publications were marrying design, typically a functional process, with photography to astounding effect which remains relevant today. We New Yorkers (1942) by Joseph Breitenbach deconstructs the human to its arterial networks which, collaged over a photograph of nighttime skyscrapers, conflating the biological and banal. Images like Komol Haircoloring advertisement (c. 1932) by Ringl and Pit and Ellen Auerbach, which mixes chainlink, paper, and wig to create a woman’s silhouette, are experimental and flagrantly multi-dimensional.
New explorational, and often cinematic visual styles found in these magazines normalized experimentation within their mediums. People were redefining what an advertisement could be, let alone a photograph. This open audit on visual standards naturally extended to social topics like race, class, and gender. Photographs like Lucile Brokaw, Piping Rock Beach, (1933) by Martin Munkacsi present the titular woman in a domineering, confidently athletic role, running on the oceanside, while photographers like Gordon Parks used portraiture to focus on, and represent black lives with dignity.
Alexey Brodovitch, Choreartium (Three Men Jumping), c. 1930s Gelatin silver print. Collection of Eric and Lizzie Himmel, New York
Modern Look captures not only the changes in photography and design facilitated by magazines, but also the changes the art brought to the ever present print medium. Works like Lester Biel’s Cover of What’s New, catches the eye with a wonderfully balanced collage featuring photographic elements and challenging color combinations of a richly orange woman casting a shadow over an underwater blue woman’s smiling visage. This evolution in process not only highlighted the advancement of magazine covers and advertisements but of the art of photography itself. Photographs like Alexey Brodovitch’s Choreartium (Three Men Jumping) (c. 1935) are daringly abstract and gestural, encouraging a modicum of literary thought. As magazine-specific concepts become more represented, they develop a codified language that is referenced in Nan Martin, Street Scene, First Avenue (1949) by Frances McLaughlin-Gill, which depicts a woman reading a newspaper, spread wide enough for the viewer to read.
As daily print publications became more widely used, the cultural waves they made had a palpable impact, and are still felt to this day. At the helm of such progress were the visionary Jewish immigrants who made an indelible mark on the medium through sheer experimentation and freedom.
Frances McLaughlin Gill, Nan Martin, Street Scene, First Avenue, 1949. Gelatin silver print. Private collection © Estate of Frances McLaughlin-Gill
