Article 26 Richard Avedon

Wish I could go to this... Looks like its gonna be great. of course how could it not be, right?

Photo Op | Richard Avedon at the I.C.P.

By BEE-SHYUAN CHANG

Photos courtesy of the Richard Avedon FoundationNaty Abascal and Ana-Maria Abascal with Helio Guerreiro, bathing suit by Brigance, Ibiza, Spain, September 1964. Photo by Richard Avelon.

What is the difference between fashion and fine art photography? Perhaps no photographer was more plagued by the dichotomy (if there in fact is one), than the late great, Richard Avedon, who pretty much disowned his fashion work in favor of his large format portraiture. The exhibition, “Avedon Fashion 1944-2000,” opening May 15 at the International Center of Photography, presents this disowned work as a seminal body of fashion photography. And none of it looks at all shabby. Co-curator Carol Squiers notes, “Fashion photography we know nominally as a woman in a dress. It’s a beauty picture with a commercial purpose to sell something. But with the best fashion photographers, it was not about promoting a particular dress. You have them doing extraordinary things.” (See the slide show below for proof.) According to Squiers, in Avedon’s view, fashion and portraiture were one and the same. “I can’t speak for him,” she says, “but my interpretation of things is that he was attacked in the late 60s for being a fashion photographer and felt he had to be taken seriously. He was never about beautiful women anyway. He was always digging into a more complex mood.”