LFI Magazine 2/2020 E

Nikos Economopoulos

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Edward Quinn

Peter Turnley

Jan Michalko

Meg Hewitt

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96 | L F I . GA L L E RY

82 | M10 MONOCHROM

More than 25 000 photographers present over half a million pictures in the LFI Gallery.

In this issue, a best-of in black and white, taken with the Leica M Monochrom

The new M10 Monochrom is a clear affirmation of Leica’s commitment to black and white photography. In contrast to its predecessor, the camera features a specially developed sensor with a significantly higher resolution than the standard M10

P H OTO

8 8 | M SUMMILUX 90

106 | EXHIBITIONS

Its extraordinary image quality and unusual compositional possibilities place the new Leica Summilux-M 90 f/1.5 Asph at the forefront of fast lenses for the Leica M-System

Gabriele Basilico, Palazzo Rom; Dawoud Bey in San Francisco; Masculinities, the Barbican Art Gallery, London; Diane Arbus, Ontario, Canada; Wright Morris, FOAM, Amsterdam

Nikos Economopoulos: from On the Road, Ghana, Cape Coast 2017

Edward Quinn 8 | LEICA CLASSIC

A gentleman rather than a paparazzo: the fifties and sixties found Edward Quinn mingling with the rich and beautiful on the Côte d’Azur Fully clad in elegant black: the new Leica M10 Monochrom

Nikos Economopoulos 2 4 | O N T H E R OA D

The Greek photographer’s current project took him all over the world in search of the perfect melange of colours, form and emotions

Meg Hewitt

108 | BOOKS New publications by Tomeu Coll, Mitra Tabrizian, Nadav Kander and Bruce Gilden 109 | LEICA GALLERIES The program of Leica Galleries worldwide. Among them, Chris Steele-Perkins in London and René Groebli in Frankfurt on the Main 1 1 0 | I N T E RV I E W The Robert Capa Contemporary Photography Center opened in Budapest in 2013. We spoke with the curators Gabriella Csizek and Emese Mucsi

3 8 | TO KYO I S YO U R S

Using strong contrasts in black and white, the Australian photographer paints an expressionist picture of the Japanese megacity and its citizens

Jan Michalko 54 | LIFE FLASHES

Berlin photographer Jan Michalko spent six months in Sir Lanka. The outcome is a delightful interplay of shapes, colours and lines

114 | MY PICTURE The return trip from a popular electro festival in Siberia took Jakob Schnetz across the snowcovered expanses of nowhere 114 | IMPRINT

Peter Turnley 68 | FRENCH KISS

A photographic love letter: as far as Turnley is concerned, there is no place where romanticism and love are as visible as in Paris

COVER: Meg Hewitt, from the Tokyo is Yours series

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EDITORIAL

H O M AG E TO T H E M THE LFI M-EDITION

Australian photographer Meg Hewitt working on her project Tokyo is Yours

The Leica M continues to be a remarkable success story: to celebrate the introduction of the M10 Monochrom on January 17, we decided to make Leica’s most tradition-steeped camera system this issue’s main visual focus. Nikos Economopoulos and Jan Michalko use their M cameras to capture the world in vibrant colours, while Peter Turnley and Meg Hewitt (pictured left) favour a classic black-and-white approach.

The Australian photographer started her project, Tokyo is Yours, with the analogue M6, before switching to the digital M9 in order to speed up her working process (see page 38) without losing the analogue feel. Her enthusiasm is undiminished: “When you’re working with instinct and emotion you really want a camera system that becomes an extension of yourself – which is what the M system is for me.”

The camera’s pared-down operating concept and manual control allows her to connect with her subjects and work unobtrusively at all times.

CONTRIBUTORS

From the early 1950s onwards, the Irishman Edward Quinn portrayed and socialised with many of the greatest stars and iconic figures of his times.

However, it was in the company of other visual artists like Pablo Picasso that he felt most at home. “I think the feeling was mutual. There is a kind of kinship between us, a mutual regard and understanding for the other person’s work,” he wrote in his memoirs in 1995. This year – on February 20 – the photographer would have celebrated his 100th birthday.

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N I KO S E C O N O M O P O U LO S The Greek photographer’s images almost look staged – but they are scenes lifted straight out of everyday life. Now he helps artists across the world master this ambitious balancing act. In the course of his workshops, Economopoulos guides amateur and professional photographers towards identifying and cultivating their own way of seeing – regardless of their respective technical abilities.

Because, he explains, a crucial element of photography is learning to trust your own instincts.

P E T E R T U R N L EY

Ever since first laying hands on an M4 in 1975, the globe-trotting photojournalist has been a passionate member of the Leica community.

Along with numerous exhibitions in Leica Galleries worldwide, he also holds street photography workshops at the Leica Akademie. With the exception of the M5, Turnley owns every single model of the M series, from the M3 to the M10. “For almost all of my life,” the photographer confesses, “my Leicas have counted among my best friends.”

Photos: © Jason Martin, © Edward Quinn Archive, © Olga Stefatou, © David Burnett

E DWA R D Q U I N N

Break the rules.

Change their view.

Tell the bitter truth.

Challenge the status.

Stand strong.

Don’t look back.

Stay hungry.

Find the spark.

Risk. Fail. Repeat. Succeed.

LEICA M10 MONOCHROM Whatever it takes - be original. leica-camera.com LEICA. DAS WESENTLICHE.

L E I C A O S KA R B A R N AC K AWA R D THE NEW PROCESS

From the top: In 2019, the LOBA was won by Mustafah Abdulaziz; the first ever winner was Floris Bergkamp in 1980; in 2009, Dominic Nahr was the recipient of the first Newcomer Award

In celebration of the 40th anniversary of the distinguished Leica Oskar Barnack Award, Leica Camera AG further heightens the prestige of the Award with a new nomination-based submission process. In a shift away from the traditional model, the LOBA will consider finalists and ultimately select winners based on nominations from 70 world-renowned photographic experts from over 30 countries. With this nomination process, the honour of being chosen as a finalist is an esteemed accomplishment in its own right, as they are recognized and hand-selected by some of the most respected persons impacting the world of photography.

Each nominator will elect three photographers based upon their personal evaluation and judgement of the photographer’s work. The only requirements for nominations for the Award are that the photographer’s work be documentary or conceptual, and dealing with the relationship between mankind and the environment. In addition to the three photographers nominated for the main Award, each nominator will select one photographer under 30 years old for the Newcomer Award.

In May, the jury will select the winner of the 2020 Leica Oskar Barnack Award. For the first time, the winner will receive a prize of €40 000, in addition to a Leica camera worth €10 000, and the publication of the photographs in an exhibition that will travel across the Leica Gallery network worldwide.

The winner of the Newcomer Award will receive a photography assignment and two weeks of tutoring at Leica Camera AG Headquarters , as well as a Leica Q worth €5000. The ceremony to present both winners will be held in Wetzlar on September 24, 2020.

A special exhibition at the Ernst Leitz Museum and Leica Gallery Wetzlar, will showcase photographs from the 2020 LOBA winner, as well as works from a selection of previous winners. Further information about the nomination jury and the prizes can be found at leica-oskar-barnack-award.com.

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Photos: © Mustafah Abdulaziz; @ Floris Bergkamp; @ Dominic Nahr

LOBA 2020

LEICA M10 MONOCHROM Whatever it takes - be original. leica-camera.com LEICA. DAS WESENTLICHE.

The Côte d’Azur in the 1950s and 1960s: a glamorous playground of the rich and beautiful, where film stars, artists, industrialists and aristocrats congregated. Edward Quinn’s images are akin to a family album of this golden era. We pay tribute to the late photographer on the centenary of his birth.

LEICA CLASSIC

Edward Quinn

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Brigitte Bardot standing outside Victorine Studios in Nice, 1956 (left) and doing the mambo (during the filming of Et Dieu Créa la Femme/And God Created Woman, previous page); Jeanne Moreau and François Truffaut, Cannes 1961; Marlon Brando at the Port of Bandol, 1956 (below); Frank Sinatra at a UN fundraising gala for refugee children at the Sporting d’Eté, Monaco 1958 (right page)

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Ella Fitzgerald (top), Dizzy Gillespie and Teddy Bruckner (below) at the Jazz Festival in Cannes, 1958. Left page: Jane Fonda and Alain Delon on the set of Les FĂŠlins (The Love Cage), Antibes 1964 (top); below: Natalie Wood and Warren Beatty at the Cannes Film Festival, 1962 (left); Elizabeth Taylor with her sons, Nice 1957 (right).

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Sophia Loren and her husband, Carlo Ponti, brave a crowd of fans and photojournalists at Nice airport, 1961

Rainier III, Prince of Monaco, shows Grace Kelly the Bengal tiger he recently acquired for his private zoo, Monaco 1955

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Painters Jean Cocteau and Raymond Moretti working on their joint project, La Naissance du Verseau, Nice 1962 (top); David Hockney leafing through Edward Quinn’s photo book, Picasso de Draeger, Paris 1975 (left)

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Clockwise from the top: Pablo Picasso and fellow painter AndrÊ Verdet look on as Cathy Hutin and Claude Picasso dance the Twist, Mougins 1962; W. Somerset Maugham at Beaulieu-sur-Mer station, 1960; Françoise Sagan, Monte Carlo 1957; Georges Simeon with his family, Cannes 1955; Pablo Picasso at his villa in Notre-Dame-de-Vie, Mougins 1961

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playing the guitar and double bass in Riviera nightclubs did not earn him an adequate living. So he taught himself photography, initially taking quaint souvenir photos as well as documenting courtroom proceedings – both with limited success. It was only when he recognised the great appetite for glamour and star portraits among the era’s many illustrated magazines, that his career began to blossom. From the late 1950s onwards, Quinn tirelessly frequented the haunts of the jet set with his Leica and a Rolleiflex. His ambition was actively supported by his Swissborn wife, Gret, who developed his films, made enlargement prints and organised their sales. In the years that followed, Quinn established an exceptional reputation; his portfolio of commissions continuously expanded, magazines competed for his images.

The late photographer’s estate archive comprises more than 100 000 negatives, representing a unique record of the golden days on the Côte d’Azur.

“One of the best things was that people had so much confidence in me, that they didn’t ask to see photographs after I had taken them. They knew that I wouldn’t go and publish anything that would be too disgraceful,” Quinn once recounted. His occupation also led to a life-long friendship with Pablo Picasso, who afforded Quinn unprecedented access to his private world.

“He doesn’t disturb me,” was the simple explanation offered by the artist, who was very conscious of his public image and the power of photography as a means of self-presentation.

Quinn’s photographs enable us to experience split-second encounters with the icons of his time. They give the viewer a feeling of having entered the world of the stars, and being granted a peek behind the scenes of their glamorous existence. In fact, the ability to find this delicate balance between perfect orchestration and spontaneous authenticity was one of the photographer’s greatest strengths. It imbues his images with a remarkably contemporary feel that allows this unique era and its extraordinary protagonists to live on to this day. ULRICH RÜTER

E D WA R D Q U I N N Born in Dublin on February 20, 1920. During World War II Quinn served as a radio navigator in the Royal Air Force.

After the war, he worked for the French airline Chartair and, subsequently, as a musician. He finally established himself as a photographer in the South of France.

The photographic kaleidoscope of his celebrity portraits is immeasurable. A significant part of his work was borne from his twenty-year friendship with Pablo Picasso, whom he photographed time and again until Picasso’s death in 1973. Quinn’s connection to Georg Baselitz was to prove equally intense.

Quinn spent the last five years of his life living near Zurich.

He passed away on January 30, 1997 in Altendorf, Switzerland.

His nephew, Wolfgang Frei, is the custodian of the photographer’s extensive archive.

E DWARDQU IN N .COM B OOKS : (selection) EDWARD QUINN, MEIN FREUND PICASSO (Wienand, Köln 2018); PICASSO SANS CLICHÉ (Hazan, Vanves 2017); CELEBRITY PETS (teNeues, Kempen 2011); RIVIERA COCKTAIL (teNeues, Kempen 2011); EDWARD QUINN: FOTOGRAF. NIZZA (Scalo, Zürich 1994)

Photos: Edward Quinn © edwardquinn.com

“He is a very charming man.” This complement could easily have been directed at the photographer; however, it was how Grace Kelly summed up her first meeting with Rainier III, Prince of Monaco. When their host was delayed by an hour, Quinn – who was assigned to cover the rendezvous for Paris Match magazine – accompanied the actress on an impromptu tour of the estate. After Prince Rainier’s arrival, he captured yet more iconic pictures of the young pair in the palace gardens. Nobody could have guessed that he was documenting the beginnings of an extraordinary love story.

The visit ended with a polite exchange of pleasantries, the photographer left with a yield of excellent material.

A year later, the film star married her prince in a fairytale wedding. The exclusive access Quinn had once enjoyed was now inconceivable: the royal couple’s public image was firmly in the hands of palace-appointed photographers and PR professionals.

Quinn’s work was characterised by a unique approach. He was more of a gentleman than a paparazzo – a quality that enabled him to move in celebrity circles without ever coming across as obtrusive. He renounced sensationalist scoops in favour of establishing a friendly rapport with his subjects. It was important to him to remain a welcome guest at the many receptions, gala evenings and festivities on the French Riviera. At the same time, Quinn had a genuine personal interest in the people he portrayed – which may, in part, be why his images are not merely nostalgic anecdotes, but are imbued with an artistic relevance that makes them compelling to this day. Very rarely, Quinn captured moments of self-aggrandising behaviour with the slightest hint of irony.

In all of his endeavours, Quinn benefited from his eloquence and likeable demeanour. The Irishman first arrived in Monaco in 1949 to seek his fortune as a musician, but soon found that

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Nikos Economopoulos

O N T H E R OA D

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Greek Magnum photographer Nikos Economopoulos spends his life on the move. With his Leica M he often captures surreally suggestive encounters between light and shadow.

His carefully composed pictures tell individually-interpretive, miniature stories full of poetry.

“It’s all about travelling without a specific purpose, being curious about what you see, being constantly surprised by new encounters,” the photographer says, describing the essence of his project.

“While taking pictures, reasoning is suspended. It’s like playing with reality”

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Economopoulos reveals contrast-rich worlds of imagery in brilliant colours for the viewer. In the nineties and the noughties, he only photographed in black and white, but recently began working with colour – a conscious decision that gave him more aesthetic freedom

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Most of the pictures for On the Road were taken in South America and Africa. Economopoulos always photographs people close up, though he proceeds with the necessary distance to grant sufficient space for his protagonists’ inner life

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On the Road is an ongoing process. As long as Economopoulos continues to enjoy travelling, he will be taking pictures of his chance encounters with his fellow human beings

N I KO S E C O N O M O P O U L O S Born in southern Greece, Economopoulos first studied law in Parma, then worked as a journalist. As of 1988 he has dedicated himself fully to photography. The photographer has been a full member of the Magnum Photo Agency since 1994, and has been published in newspapers and magazines all over the world.

His photo book, In the Balkans, is one of his most important publications.

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Photos: Nikos Economopoulos /Magnum Photos

Influenced by photographers like Sergio Larrain and Josef Koudelka, the native Greek photographer Nikos Economopoulos began to explore questions of identity and belonging in the late eighties. His interest in minorities, border crossings and the movement of migrants, have been transformed into emotionally-laden images that have been seen around the world. Economopoulos finds his inspiration in far-off places, expressively painting the pictures produced for his long-term project, On the Road, with brushstrokes of powerful colours.

As in his earlier projects, this one also thrives on human interaction, once again highlighting his unique style of showing empathy and aesthetics.

LFI: Mr Economopoulos, when on the move, please describe for us the kind of situations that inspire you to reach for your camera.

When I perceive a visual event around me. Almost always it starts with content. Something that happens, no matter how small, that carries a particular charge and sets things flowing: a gesture, a glance, a bond. Something that registers in a certain way that may not be easily described in words. Once I perceive something that ignites my visual curiosity and triggers my imagination, I look for other elements that may exist synchronically: light, geometry, balance. Of course, it all takes place within an instant. When some of those elements appear to be there, surrounding the initial impetus, then there is a visual event.

A few years ago you were still working in black and white, but your most recent pictures celebrate the diversity of colour. How did this change come about?

Digital photography allowed me to surpass technical issues that had to do with colour depiction, and to experiment with colour. Aesthetically, it was always in my mind but I did not

have the technical control. It is more challenging, there are many factors to deal with, compared to black and white, where you are dealing predominantly with the balance between form and content. In colour, you have a range of things, the relations between high and low lights, or between the different colours, etc.

What situations inspire your photographic work most of all?

The situations that give me the greatest joy are those where there is a flow of human interaction, where you find an abundance of emotions, where barriers are overcome; where you can sense life with all its tension, its little truths, its lack of perfection.

The way you play with light and shadow is very precise. What role does natural lighting have in your photographs?

Natural light is always the starting point. But I was using other means, like underexposure, as a way to intervene. When I was photographing in black and white, I would always opt for diffused light. I preferred cloudy weather and avoided the sun. Now I can get to experiment more.

What can photography change from the point of view of society?

If you are asking me if photography can change the world, the answer is no. Not much. It can raise awareness but not in the way it did in the past. Maybe photography was more potent in its early days, at its time of innocence. Maybe the spell is now lost, maybe it isn’t. Not if you look at its poetic dimension, and the ways in which poetry – and photography can be a kind of poetry – can make us better human beings.

Do you think that your photographic eye has changed over the years?

I do not believe that the core substance really changes. Some peripheral characteristics change, but not the core. I mean the inner force of the image, that has nothing to do with the technical characteristics, but rather with one’s own subjective engagement. The one thing I have learned is to be honest in your images and to never do something simply because you believe that others may want it or like it. It must always be because you want it. It is the only sustainable thing to do. And it’s worth it, because it makes you happy.

You run workshops, portfolio reviews and masterclasses. Could you point out specifically what the difference is between a good and a bad picture?

A good image is one you remember.

Where the relation between form and content works in such a way that contributes to the overall balance. What it also needs is emotions. It can’t be good without it. A good image for me, must have elements of abstraction.

It cannot be a simple description of something beautiful or something interesting. A good image must resonate in a deeply personal way.

What types of camera do you use when you’re travelling and why?

At the moment, the Leica M10 is the camera I use most. As I travel extensively, I prefer to move as light as possible and to focus on more substantial things beyond equipment, to keep my attention on the frame. In recent years, I’ve extended my collection – all the models I’ve ever had, from my very first M3 to the most recent model, altogether six analogue and two digital cameras. A Leica camera is a precision instrument, but it’s so much more than just that. Careful thinking has gone into every single detail; the user interface, the design, the precision, and even the size. The fact that it is no bigger than your hand, allows you to use it with great ease. I greatly appreciate that. INTERVIEW: DANILO RÖSSGER ON TH E ROAD.GR EQUIPMENT: Leica M9 and Leica M10 with Summicron-M 35 f/2 Asph

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Meg Hewitt

Fascinated by Japanese photography and the Provoke group in particular, the Australian self-made photographer, Meg Hewitt, headed to Tokyo to produce an emotional series that transcends photojournalism and leaves room for the viewer’s imagination.

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While working, Meg Hewitt imagines a room full of pictures that she still wants to take – in this manner, the photographer ensures that the images for her book project have a visual correlation

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Hewitt works up close to people. In the picture on the left, her friend Yuka uses body language to demonstrate how she felt after the TĹ?hoku earthquake in 2011, when she was stuck in Tokyo. The large picture below shows Kerobokan train station, where the entrance to the Sumo Stadium is also located

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The photographer began her project with an analogue Leica M6. She developed the film by hand and scanned it.

In order to be able to work more quickly, she learned how to digitally emulate the graininess of film

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MEG HEWITT After completing her studies in Visual Arts, Meg Hewitt spent twelve years running her own restaurant in Sydney before turning to photography.

Nowadays, she works on her projects, assists a master printer and runs workshops. Her photo book, Tokyo is Yours, received a number of international awards. In 2019, the photographer had her first solo exhibition in Europe at the Anne Clergue Gallery in Arles.

ME G HE W I TT.CO M LF I -O NL I N E .D E / B LOG : FURTHER IMAGES FROM MEG HEWITT’S PORTFOLIO EQUIPMENT: Leica M6 and M9 with Summi-

cron-M 28 f/2 Asph and 35 f/2 Asph

Exalted gestures, obscure figures and unusual settings, Meg Hewitt’s photography can be described as expressive.

In Japan, and particularly Tokyo, the Australian photographer found a perfect stage for her photographic creativity. The often exaggerated poses of her protagonists; encountered on the street, in the underground, or at particular kinds of bars, are reminiscent of Japanese Noh dance performers, a tradition that interests her. Even pictures without people look like bizarre theatre backdrops: ventilation shafts crawling along like worms, a displaced-looking group of cranes made out of concrete, a house that seems to have eyes, and between all that an owl in a café.

Hewitt often incorporates local iconography into her pictures, such as wrestling posters and Sumo advertisements. In a similar fashion to photographer duo Caimi & Piccinni, Hewitt prefers to move in the underground scene and in private settings. She avoids slick, faceless Tokyo clichés like skyscrapers and masses of people. Her photography delves deeper, and this also has something to do with the way she works: “I have always been the kind of person that gets in crazy situations, I like to go with the flow and meet people and explore their ideas and ways of living.” In the process, she is always looking for the digressive, things apart that most people would simply pass by. “Many things in life are stranger than fiction and I feel compelled to try and capture them so as to explain them to other people or to revisit the moment myself.”

Following the disastrous Tōhoku earthquake in 2011, Hewitt decided to travel to Tokyo. The mega metropolis, located only 250 kilometres south of the disaster zone, was in a state of absolute shock. The evacuation of so many people would have been impossible. Yet, despite the dramatic situation during those days, the Australian photographer encountered the lively subculture that she so loves, unchanged.

She describes it as follows: “The situation was like science-fiction but unfortunately it was also very real.

When I first visited Tokyo for the project I would see a graffiti tag everywhere ‘Tokyo is Yours’. It was like a proclamation that, despite what had happened, Tokyo still was.”

Hewitt’s work has been inspired by photographers Trent Parke and Anders Pedersen, where the relationship to the protagonists – as can be seen in Pedersen’s photo book, Café Lehmitz – is something she finds particularly interesting. The Japanese photography group Provoke, which has shifted from purely documentary to something more allegorical and emotional, is another influence. She is not concerned with producing a technically perfect picture, but rather drawing out the transience of a piece of eternity. Hewitt experimented for a long time with analogue photography, so as to find her own style of coarse-grained, black and white imagery.

The M6 was Hewitt’s camera of choice right from the beginning, before later changing to a digital M9.

“When you are working with instinct and emotion you really want a camera system that becomes an extension of yourself in the way that the M system does. The simplicity of use and manual control allows use of the camera to become second nature, an extension of your mind and body.” Going in so close to people as she does, a discrete camera like the M is of great advantage, because the impression is less aggressive. Hewitt also realises that for her taking pictures is like an ongoing battle against finiteness. When she is older, she wants to be able to look back on as many exciting memories as possible: “Memories are formed with images.

We leave a little bit of ourselves in the places we travel to and we revisit these memories and explore not just the place but part of ourselves.” Thanks to Tokyo is Yours, both she and her viewers will be able to remember her experiences in the Japanese capital for a long time to come. DENISE KLINK

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Jan Michalko LIFE FLASHES

Heat, noise, and a myriad of colours: for six months, Michalko lived and worked on the island of Sri Lanka. His images capture the vibrancy of everyday life in an extraordinary country.

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Jan Michalko tirelessly snapped his way across the island of Sri Lanka, capturing everyday life as it unfolded before him: the day labourers in the capital of Colombo, traffic wardens, commuters travelling home from work.

Everyone squeezes into overcrowded trains in a bid to escape the chaos on the streets

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In the city of Kandy, a snake charmer is waiting for his audience to gather for the show. Snakes are a recurring theme in this series, as are the day labourers, who can be seen in every part of the country

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Nothing is quite as colourful as the tiny shops that seem to sell absolutely everything local households need

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Above: this day labourer from Pettah, a neighbourhood in Colombo, has become a local celebrity for his fashion style. Right: the snake charmer from Peradeniya proudly holds up his Cobra for the camera

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Clockwise from the top left: traders transport their wares across the island in decorated trucks; to capture this scene of young Muslimmen travelling in an overcrowded train, Michalko mounted flash guns onto tripods and waited for the train to drive past; Colombo’s neighbourhood of Pettah

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Red is the colour of love – and the rambutan, a fruit also known as ‘hairy lychees’.

A street vendor sells the luscious fruit in the centre of Kandy

J A N M I C H A L KO Having started out as a self-taught photographer, Jan Michalko was chosen to participate in the World Press Photo Joop Swart Masterclass.

He lives and works in Berlin as a freelance photographer, with a primary focus on reportage and documentary photography. His work has been featured in numerous international newspapers and magazines. He is currently working on a series about his travel experiences in India.

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Winter in Berlin can be a bleak prospect. Grey skies, wrapped-up figures and listless faces all meld into a homogenous impression of lacklustre hues.

For some, this is reason enough to pack their bags and seek out gentler climes: Berlin-based photographer Jan Michalko has made three trips to Sri Lanka to date, exploring the island for two months each time. What Michalko found was a paradise in the middle of the Indian Ocean where time seems to have stood still – an enchanted land of palm trees, luscious vegetation and colonial architecture.

Most of all, the island is like a vibrant explosion of colours. “To be here is to be transported into a different world,” he says. “Colours are both life-affirming and emotive, and have become the core theme of my current work.”

On the streets of Sri Lanka, Michalko photographed day labourers and shop owners, porters and snake catchers, as well as the objects that make up people’s everyday lives – from ordinary household items to buses and trains. It was the combination of shapes, colours and lines that particularly fascinated the photographer. “I didn’t want to just take travel pictures that show what Sri Lanka looks like,” he explains. “For me, it was less about content and more about an artistic evolution.” To describe his visual approach, he used the example of observing somebody make a cup of Chai tea: for the artist, it is not the act of tea-making that draws his attention, but the metallic sheen of the kettle, the rising steam, or the torn, pink plastic tarpaulin in the background.

The inspiration for this series partly stems from the photographer’s sister, the painter Monika Michalko, whose expansive paintings are composed of intensely colour-saturated objects and forms. When the siblings decided to create an exhibition that would echo the realities and mysteries of Sri Lankan life, they joined

forces to explore the island. Despite their different choice of media, their results share a common trait: every image is a sea of opulent colours that seem entirely unbound by traditional configurations of surfaces and space.

“My primary focus was on the graphic elements and forms within the images,” the photographer explains. “When choosing my subjects, I usually noticed the background before anything else: a billboard with a colourful pattern, paint peeling off a surface, an interesting space. I then simply captured people going about their business against this backdrop.”

The scenes in Michalko’s photographs are entirely unstaged. He carefully approached his subjects, biding his time until they were so used to this presence that they forgot he was there. The people featured in his images are almost like extras on a stage, rushing past the photographer, rarely turning their face to the camera. They are integral elements of what Michalko considers to be a successful composition: every pose, every gesture, has to be in a harmonious relationship to its environment. If a scene fulfils these criteria, Michalko goes into what he calls ‘tunnel vision’ mode, and acts incredibly fast.

The images in this series were taken with the Leica M240 as well as the Leica M10, combined with 28 and 50mm fixed focal length lenses. An especially striking aspect of his photographs is their luminance – even with an overcast sky, the bodies, garments, faces, plastic bags and buckets seem to radiate off the page. He achieved this effect by using a powerful flash set-up – an approach he first adopted some twenty years ago. He even created a custom-made solution to combine his flash guns with the Leica. “I built a flash cable and connected it to the transmitter. Instead of attaching the transmitter to the top of the camera, as is customary, I hung it on my belt, which made the camera easier to handle.”

He then mounted the flash guns on tripods of varying sizes, placed them on top of boxes, hung them from trees or attached them to tuk-tuks.

Other times, he handed them to local onlookers, spontaneously turning them into his assistants.

There is a snapshot character to Michalko’s images, as though he had managed – almost in passing – to capture the dynamic essence of everyday life in Sri Lanka. Buzzing with energy and bursting with colour, his pictures are like a medley of exotic sweets that last forever. Many of the images were taken in the capital, Colombo, others are the result of numerous trips across the island. The post-processing was limited to colour and contrast correction – the images were neither cropped nor manipulated.

There is a recurring theme in this series that seems both alien and dangerous to most European viewers: the apparent omnipresence of snakes.

In Sri Lanka, cobras and vipers can be found curled up in bushes or loitering in residential areas. The snake catcher Michalko photographed against the backdrop of a blue wall, half-concealed behind a cobra and illuminated by a bright flash, was someone he had simply met in a bar. His job consists of catching stray snakes in people’s gardens, and releasing them back into the wild. Occasionally, however, he will take a shine to one of them and keep it at his home. And so, when Michalko visited the house of his new acquaintance, he found himself in a room with seven cobras and three pythons. “That was definitely a unique experience,” he remembers. “This guy also works as a snake charmer, he takes the animals with him on the bus, stowed away in a gym bag.” In Asia, snakes symbolise a strong life force – rather like dynamic colours. KATJA HÜBNER

JAN MIC H ALKO.COM LF I-ON LIN E .DE /B LOG: JAN MICHALKO, ONE PHOTO — ONE STORY EQUIPMENT: Leica M240 and Leica M10 with Summilux-M 28 f/1.4 and Summilux-M 50 f/1.4, as well as different flash guns

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Peter Turnley FRENCH KISS

The American photographer, Peter Turnley, now also a French citizen, chose to make his home in the French capital nearly fifty years ago. His pictures document the hustle and bustle on the streets, while paying tribute to life and love.

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Love is in the air: Peter Turnley succumbed to charm of the city when he first arrived in Paris in 1975

Ever since Grand Master photographers like Henri-Cartier Bresson and Robert Doisneau put their fellow human beings at the centre of their creative work, photography and philanthropy have enjoyed a close association. It is no coincidence these two chroniclers inspired Peter Turnley to pick up a camera at a young age, and to head out on explorations. Defined by late sixties and seventies society in the USA, and a progressive upbringing in an otherwise rather conservative part of the country, Turnley’s humanist outlook towards his surroundings was reflected in his early photographs.

When they were just seventeen, Peter and his twin brother David,

set out to document life on a working class street, McClellan Street, of their home town, Fort Wayne, Indiana.

The one-year photographic project brought the brothers to the attention of many of the leaders of the New York photography community and led to their first publication in the magazine, 35mm Photography.

Not least, one of the great lessons learned during that project was that a photographer does not need to travel far to discover an insightful story. If one goes through life with eyes wide open, the questioning gaze of Turnley’s photographic icons, and appropriate empathy, fascinating life will be found right in your own backyard. Even so, Turnley’s curiosity and wanderlust grew the more pictures he made. He quickly became aware of the doors

photography opened for him: into unknown places and into the hearts of his fellow human beings. Today, he continues to work according to the principles taken from The Family of Man: there are more things between heaven and earth that bring people together than there are that divide them. This philosophy has served Turnley well during his decades-long career, leading him to document numerous significant, incisive and sometimes dark, chapters of world history, yet managing to be at home across the globe. But, there is one place that has firmly captured the globe-trotting photographer’s heart, and that place is Paris. →

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The photo journalist photographed many conflicts on assignment for Newsweek, and for other important magazines worldwide. It was on the streets of Paris he found harmony and love – a necessary balance reflecting his overall vision of life and the world

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Turnley: “I’ve travelled all over the world, and I can say with conviction that there is no place where romanticism, love and tenderness are so openly and consistently on display as in Paris.”

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According to Turnley, photographers do not need to reinvent the world – there is marvel in the realities of life everywhere.

Even so, they should be able to convey the poetry so that the viewer can feel it

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Turnley’s pictures are always the expression of his own feeling for life. “I don’t think that photography is just about technique and technology,” he reflects. “It’s much more about seeing, feeling, sharing, and the creation of memories for eternity”

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PETER TURNLEY Turnley has worked in more than 90 countries, and photographed important geopolitical events of the last four decades. He has portrayed personalities such as Barack Obama, Fidel Castro and Lady Di and published seven books. He was delighted in making pictures of daily life in his home of choice, Paris, ever since 1975. Turnley also leads workshops on street photography.

Turnley first moved to the French capital in 1975 where he attended the Sorbonne and began to familiarise himself with the language and the civilisation. In addition to his studies, he began taking pictures of lively café scenes in the Marais district. It was a time when his life underwent no less that an ‘emotionally uplifting revolution’. Fascinated by the history, beauty and the political and social diversity, he fell head-over-heels in love with the French metropolis. On completing his studies at the University of Michigan, he returned to Paris, completed a graduate degree, worked as a printer and later as a photojournalist.

From that point on, Paris became his home of choice, the anchor point from where his soaring career took off. The full-time photographer became a full-blooded photographer. Even though Turnley has travelled to more than 90 countries, portraying countless people of significance to world history, his heart remains captive to the city of love, where he continues his fourty-five year documentation on the life of the city. Paris offers Turnley a balance for his vision of the human condition – a contrast to many of the scenes of conflict and human difficulty he witnesses as a photojournalist.

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For him, there is no other place in the world where romanticism, love and tenderness are so openly and consistently on display. While out on his photographic forays, he follows the golden words spoken by his close friend, Edouard Boubat: “If you keep your eyes and heart open, and your head up, there is a gift waiting at the corner of every street.” Consequently, Turnley’s images introduce a gentle breath of hope into a world that can often be fraught with challenges.

However, Turnley would have been unable to write his photographic love letter without his intimate companion – the Leica M. “I nourish the strong feeling that a camera should be like a best-friend that you always want to have around,” Turnley explains. “Discretion, elegance, precision and the quality of the lenses – I find all these features in Leica cameras.”

His love letter reveals that the classic reportage camera can also be ideal for capturing daily life, as long as you bring along an ability to sense authenticity and an active interest in your fellow human beings. The photographer’s poetic, black and white compositions show us that it is always worthwhile to pay attention to the life-affirming aspects of existence – making us just a bit more aware of the fact that our world is a special place to live. DANILO RÖSSGER

WWW.PE TE RTU RN LEY.COM LF I-ON LIN E .DE /B LOG: MOMENTS OF THE HUMAN CONDITION ­— TURNLEY IN CUBA EQUIPMENT: Leica M2, M3, M4, M6, M7, M8, M9, M Monochrom, M10 with Summilux-M 1:1.4/35 Asph amongst others

F/ S TOP – M 1 0 M O N O C H R O M – S U M M I L U X- M 9 0 F/ 1 . 5 A S P H –

T H E WA I T I S OV E R : T H E LEICA M10 MONOCHROM WITH HIGH-RESOLUTION 41 - M E G A P I X E L S E N S O R I S N OW AVA I L A B L E

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M O D E R N T RA D I T I O N LEICA M10 MONOCHROM

The M10 Monochrom is a clear affirmation of Leica’s ongoing commitment to black and white photography. In contrast to its predecessor, the new camera features a specially developed sensor with a significantly higher resolution than the standard M10.

There was a time when the idea of a digital camera dedicated solely to black and white photography seemed like a daring experiment. The concept has been around almost as long as digital Leica cameras themselves, not least because there has always been a strong affinity with classic black and white photography among Leica employees.

But the reality of such a venture was, initially, deemed a considerable risk. For one, there was the issue of developing a special sensor without a colour filter array; and secondly, there were concerns that it would only appeal to a niche market of enthusiasts wishing to complement their colourcapable main camera.

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success, and was soon followed by a second, and now a third, variant. This latest model represents a great evolutionary leap, featuring (for the first time) an exclusively developed sensor with a significantly higher resolution than its colour counterpart – namely a remarkable 41 megapixels.

By now, the monochrome M variant has firmly established itself as an equal member of the M family. This is also underlined by the new camera’s name, M10 Monochrom, which overtly references the M model on which it is based.

The first M Monochrom was derived from the M9, its successor from the M (Typ 240); both were fitted with the standard variant’s image sensor – minus the colour filter array. This meant that each individual sen-

sor pixel recorded only luminance information, resulting in a greatly increased image quality. When the M (Typ 240) was succeeded by the M10, Leica improved many aspects of the camera, but chose to maintain the same sensor resolution.

EXC LUSI V E SE NSO R .

However, this has no bearings on the M10 Monochrom – because, for this camera, Leica opted for a considerably more spectacular and ambitious approach: the M10 Monochrom is equipped with its own, brand-new sensor, whose 41-megapixel resolution not only far exceeds that of the colour-capable M10, but also surpasses that of the M Monochrom (Typ 246). Apart from the sensor, the technical specifications of the M10 Monochrom

are almost identical to those of the M10 – or, more precisely, the ultra-robust M10-P. This also applies to the camera’s Maestro image processor and motherboard.

Which brings us to the technicalities of the M10 Monochrom’s exceedingly high resolution, compared to the colour-capable M10.

The monochrome sensor stores only one brightness value per pixel, instead of three colour values. Consequently – despite the larger number of pixels – the data volume for each image is smaller. Furthermore, the monochrome sensor does not have to carry out any colour interpolation (whereby a pixel’s missing colour information is calculated from the value of the neighbouring pixels). This, in turn, leaves the processor and all other elec- →

The M10 Monochrom is based on the M10-P, and has been designed without the red Leica dot. All engravings and markings on this elegant camera also adhere to a very discreet aesthetic. Even the rear display only uses colour to highlight in-focus areas and provide faultyexposure alerts

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The detail resolution would have been enough for a much larger print than this double page. Thanks to the high dynamic range, it is possible to capture an extraordinary amount of detail in highlight and shadow areas

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tronic camera components with plenty of capacity to handle the sensor’s higher resolution. Indeed, we detected hardly any signs of a decelerated camera operation in our practice test.

In burst mode, the buffer memory inevitably fills up a little faster than on the standard model – but then, this hardly counts among the M10 Monochrom’s main areas of application. For all conventional tasks, the camera performs quickly and without any lag.

What was very noticeable, however, was the M10 Monochrom’s extraordinary resolution. As with its predecessor, the omission of a colour filter array – and the loss-free recording of relevant information by each

pixel this facilitates – gives rise to a natural sharpness that a colour camera is generally unable to achieve.

A colour sensor, whose RGB filters are arranged in a Bayer filter mosaic, relies on the afore-mentioned interpolation algorithm to construct the final image.

While this works much better than one might assume, it is not entirely loss-free, which means that some slight sharpening of the image will be required.

B LACK A N D W HITE SPECIA LIST. Photographs taken

with the M10 Monochrom look more natural and unmanipulated by comparison.

Also, the detail rendition is genuinely breathtaking – which allows some of Leica’s

“America’s Premier Leica Specialist”

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current M lenses, such as the Apo-Summicron-M 50 f/2 Asph, for example, to finally perform to their full potential; at the same time, the optical weaknesses of some older lenses become a lot more apparent – which is exactly how it should be: if the camera shows up every strength and weakness, the image quality primarily depends upon the lens.

Despite the qualitative benefits of a monochromeonly recording, there are also some advantages to simply converting RGB images to black and white: if a picture was originally recorded in colour, you are able to finely tune the degree to which each colour is transcribed to the greyscale image in post-processing.

With a monochrome camera, on the other hand, you have to apply colour filters during shooting if you wish to influence the appearance of the final result.

As is to be expected, all other characteristics of the new ‘M10M’ are also of the highest quality. According to the camera’s specifications, it offers a dynamic range of 15 stops – two more than the standard M10. This means that there is plenty of scope for post-processing adjustments, such as the intense brightening of shadows and the recovery of highlight details. In fact, when editing images taken with the M10 Monochrom, it is well worth taking a bolder approach and pushing the gradation curve without too much restraint.

AVAILABL E L IGHT. There

is another aspect in which the M10 Monochrom outperforms its predecessor: its sensitivity range, which goes up to ISO 100 000, now starts at ISO 160 instead of ISO 320. This lower base ISO provides more leeway for shooting with a wider aperture, even in bright light.

At the same time, the new camera also cuts a fine figure when it comes to Available Light photography.

There may be an unwritten law that a higher resolution with smaller pixels equals more noise and a decreased dynamic range – but the M10 Monochrom shows no sign of this whatsoever. Quite the opposite, in fact: the higher ISO settings are very much there to be used,

and even at ISO 12 500, the noise is just a faint, background grain effect that is easily removed.

With its elegant, matte-black exterior, the M10 Monochrom is also stunning to look at. Based on the M10-P, it has the same, extremely quiet shutter, and features neither a red dot nor an eye-catching engraving. On the top plate, the word ‘Monochrom’ is written in tiny letters; the Leica script on the rear of the camera is also just a small engraving with no colour inlay. Aside from the red locking latch (which is covered by the lens), the camera body is entirely black.

Only the display offers some discreet colour elements to mark in-focus areas in

TOO S P EC IA L TO BE A SECOND CAMERA: M OR E T HA N A N Y OT HER M M ODEL , T HE M10 MONOCHROM EN A B L E S M O D E R N L E N S E S TO PERFORM TO THEIR F U L L C A PAC IT Y.

Focus Peaking, and alert the photographer to problematic exposure settings.

The new monochrome M model is clearly a camera for those with a decisive mind, who are willing to embrace b&w photography in the fullest sense. While it might be tempting to class the M10 Monochrom as a very highend second camera, this would not do justice to its extraordinary capabilities.

Instead, it is uniquely positioned to prove that b&w photography is not merely a nostalgic homage to the past, but is, in fact, headed for an exciting future. In any case, those wishing to create compositions of shadow and light will find this camera to be the perfect companion.

HOLGER SPARR

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ANYTHING GOES L E I C A S U M M I L U X- M 9 0 F/ 1 . 5 A S P H

The new Summilux-M 90 f/1.5 Asph lens represents the pinnacle of fast lenses for Leica M cameras – both in terms of image quality and creative possibilities.

With the Summilux-M 90 f/1.5 Asph Leica continue their range of extremely fast lenses, which now spans seamlessly from 21 to 90 mm – covering all of the most important focal lengths. With its traditional portrait focal length, the new 90mm lens is not only the longest lens in this segment, but also a classic contender for a wide maximum aperture. Leica do, of course, already offer a lightsensitive portrait tele – the Summicron-M 90mm f/2 Asph. However, the new Summilux goes several steps further, with its shallower depth of field, more ambitious focus and, inevitably, next-level pricing. It offers the advantage of an enormously high light sensitivity for this focal length, and all of the creative possibilities this entails.

SPE C I A L PO RT RA I TS.

The construction of the Summilux-M 90 f/1.5 Asph is based on the renowned Noctilux-M 75 f/1.25 Asph – the bodies of the two lenses are almost identical

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When composing a portrait in its most classic form, with the subject’s face captured at close range, the Summilux’s exceptional light sensitivity does not necessarily come into play.

At a focusing distance of one meter, the wide open lens yields a depth of field of just about 11 mm, which is barely enough to get the eye area in focus – though it does open up the possibility of isolating minute details from the background. The Summilux truly comes into its own at greater distances: even at three metres, the in-focus area is only around ten centimetres deep. But Leica lenses are not just distinguished by their exceedingly sharp rendition, but also by their aesthetic interpretation of out-of-focus areas – and

this, in particular, is where the Summilux-M 90 leaves nothing to be desired.

Especially at fully open aperture, the SummiluxM 90 delivers a pleasantly smooth bokeh, without any hard edges between the sharp and defocused parts of the image. Distant highlights captured with a wide open lens are rendered with a beautifully soft effect; when stopping down, their form is slightly altered as they take on the shape of the circular, eleven-bladed aperture. In addition to producing a smooth transition from sharpness into blur, the state-of-the-art Summilux-M 90 f/1.5 Asph delivers an extremely sharp rendition even at fully open aperture, with only the slightest, usually imperceptible, fall-off in the outermost corners. In fact, even with this extremely lightsensitive lens, stopping down is only ever a compositional option, rather than a technical necessity.

T E C H NI CA L DE TA I LS.

The construction of the Summilux-M 90 f/1.5 Asph is based on the Noctilux-M 75 f/1.25 Asph (LFI 1/2018, page 66), whose lens body it has adopted. Two of the Summilux’s eight lens elements, which are assembled in six groups, have aspheric surfaces. A floating element ensures a consistently high imaging performance at all distances. Even the vignetting (which is inevitable →

When captured with an open aperture, distant bright spots are rendered in a wonderful manner.

Image: Markus Tedeskino

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Thanks to its high light sensitivity, the Summilux-M 90 allows for the almost complete dissolution of the background into blur, even at longer shooting distances. Images: Markus Tedeskino (top), Eolo Perfido (below)

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The high lens speed not only facilitates an extremely narrow depth of field, but also allows for short exposure times even in challenging Available Light conditions. Images: E. Perfido (top), M. Teskino (below)

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The high lens speed not only facilitates an extremely narrow depth of field, but also allows for short exposure times even in challenging lighting conditions – which translates into genuine Available Light capabilities. Image: Eolo Perfido

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M lenses should probably not get much larger than this: the Summilux-M 90 clearly protrudes into the rangefinder viewfinder’s line of vision

in any high-speed lens, though easy to fully eliminate in post-processing) is kept to an absolute minimum, and can be avoided almost entirely by slightly stopping down.

Incidentally, there is a simple reason why the Summilux was not designed to be even faster: in a 90mm lens with M bayonet, almost the entire available space is taken up by the rear lens element, so that an even wider maximum aperture would not have been feasible from an engineering point of view. It is a testament to Leica’s integrity that the company was not tempted to exploit the tolerances so that, on paper, the lens speed could have been listed as f/1.4.

Although this cameralens combination still counts as manageable, the 1010gram Summilux-M 90 f/1.5 Asph definitely hampers the light-weight character usually associated with Leica’s M cameras. The lens body also protrudes into the field of vision of both the rangefinder viewfinder, and the lens itself.

All of this is simply par for the course when working with this lens – as is a willingness to embrace focusing as a positive challenge. The latter has always been true for M photographers shooting with a 90mm lens; however, the new Summilux with its extremely narrow depth of field requires even greater precision and skill.

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Setting the focus with the rangefinder viewfinder takes practice, especially considering the large size of the viewfinder image in comparison to the fairly small frame lines for the tele lens. This is where an electronic viewfinder can serve as a good alternative option and useful technical aid, as its Focus Peaking function will make in-focus areas visible by highlighting them in colour. In our test, we applied the Focus Peaking method via the display, as well as the optional Visoflex. Both proved successful, though the latter yielded considerably better results.

While the 90mm Summilux is clearly an M lens, it is also compatible with the SL2 via an optional adapter,

and delivers an excellent performance in conjunction with the camera’s extremely high-resolution viewfinder.

OU TSTA N D IN G R E SU LTS.

Achieving sharp focus when shooting with an open aperture takes a lot of skill, regardless of which viewfinder is used. However, there will also be times when you might choose to stop down by one or two f-numbers, especially as the in-focus area of this lens can be extremely small, even at long shooting distances – the extreme light sensitivity of the Summilux-M 90 is not suitable for every subject.

Those willing to invest both the money and practice that are undeniably required to call this lens their own, will

THE HIGH-PRECISION FOCUSING SKILLS REQUIRED FOR THIS LENS TAKE A GREAT DEAL OF PRACTICE – BUT THE IMAGE S T HAT C A N B E AC HIEV ED A R E OU T OF T HIS WOR L D.

find themselves richly rewarded: once the trial phase is over, you will have the potential to create the most interesting images that can be achieved in the field of ambitious photography.

In essence, the new Summilux-M 90 f/1.5 facilitates a vast range of creative possibilities that break the mould of what could previously be accomplished with this focal length in the full-frame format. The Summilux’s capacity for high-precision configurations of sharpness and blur is unprecedented– opening up entirely new levels of visual expression, and making this an extremely appealing choice for any photographer in search of the truly extraordinary.

HOLGER SPARR

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B E S T O F L F I . G A L L E RY

MASSIVE BUILDING “For me, the 158 hectares Ibirapuera Park in São Paulo represents an island of tranquillity in a city that suffers from an overwhelming amount of traffic. This building, designed by the architect Oscar Niemeyer, was and is seminal. The two small figures in the picture illustrate the power of this breathtaking piece of architecture, that will far outlive us all.”

Wulf Rössler Leica M Monochrom with Summicron-M 28 f/2 Asph

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L IG H T BOX

FISH MARKET I N T O K YO “Before ten o’clock, the Tsukuji Fish Market in Tokyo is usually closed to the general public, so as not to disturb the trading.

Even so, one day I managed to pay a visit at six in the morning. Thanks to my inconspicuous camera, I was able to take this picture, that still makes me proud today.”

Rully Nasrullah Leica M Monochrom with Summilux-M 35 f/1.4 Asph

SCEPTICAL EXPRESSIONS “This shot was taken during a workshop I gave in a village in the province of Guizhou in South China.

I always encourage the participants not to pay for someone to pose for a picture. I must admit, however, that I did purchase something from these two women before taking the picture.”

Leo Kwok Leica M Monochrom with Summilux-M 50 f/1.4 Asph

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SITTING BULL “When I’m in a city I’ve never been to before, I’m always on the look out for people and situations that are unusual.

I was visiting Antwerp for the first time when I spotted this man, whose physical dimensions really impressed me. I waited for him to sit down and pretty much fill up the whole picture.”

Antonio Sánchez-Barriga Leica M Monochrom (Typ 246) with SummiluxM 35 f/1.4 Asph

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PURE N O S TA L G I A “After spending a day at the Blackpool Pleasure Beach amusement park with its neck-breaking, high-speed carousels, I discovered this rather suggestively nostalgic ‘tram boat’.

Sitting as it was in the warm, evening light, it created a pleasant contrast to the strident carnival rides in the background.”

Daniele Zullino Leica M Monochrom (Typ 246) with Summmicron-M 35 f/2 Asph

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CONSPICUOUS GUY

FORBIDDEN NAKEDNESS

“I took this photo of Senay in Berlin, because we had been having a nice conversation. What I didn’t know at the time is that he is well-known in the city, as an artist, model and DJ. Since then we’ve become friends and I gave him a print of this portrait as a present.”

“It was one of the hottest days of the year, and this tourist, who it seemed had been fishing, couldn’t stand it any more and took off his shirt. In fact, in Japan you’re not allowed to do so, but in such a remote place near Oita, located on the island of Kyushu, it turned out to be possible.”

Roland Blazejewski Leica M Monochrom with Voigtländer Color-Skopar II 35 mm f/2.5

Ikuo Inoue Leica M Monochrom with Summicron-M 50 f/2 Asph

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E XOT I C B U T T E R F LY “On my last birthday I decided to take the day off to visit the Papiliorama – Swiss Tropical Gardens with my children.

In this tropical garden, located right in the middle of Switzerland, there is a large domed area where thousands of exotic butterflies flutter freely around the visitors.”

Roger Oltramare Leica M Monochrom (Typ 246) with SummiluxM 50 f/1.4 Asph

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P H OTO – B O O K S – E X H I B I T I O N S – F E S T I VA L S – AWA R D S –

Thomas Dworzak, Taliban portrait. Kandahar, Afghanistan 2002 © Collection T. Dworzak/Magnum Photos

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G A B R I E L E B AS I L I C O

Photos:© Dawoud Bey/courtesy the artist and Stephen Daiter Gallery, Chicago; © Archivio Gabriele Basilico; © Estate of Wright Morris, Collection of Gregory R. Miller and Michael Wiener © Catherine Opie, courtesy Regen Projects, Los Angeles; Thomas Dane Gallery, London, and Soloman R. Guggenheim Museum, New York; © Diane Arbus

PA L A Z Z O, R O M

DAWO U D B E Y SFMOMA, SAN FRANCISCO

Dawoud Bey was given his first camera in 1968. It was after visiting the Harlem on my Mind exhibition at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York that he decided on a career in photography. “It begins with the subject, a deep interest in wanting to describe the black subject in a way that’s as complex as the experiences of anyone else,” he describes his approach. “It’s meant to kind of reshape the world, one person at a time.”

Dawoud Bey centres his work in the America experienced by black people and immigrants; giving faces to the under-represented, the excluded and the discriminated against. Corey Keller, curator of photography at SFMOMA, explains Bey’s work, “He sees making art as not merely personal expression but as an act of social responsibility, emphasising the necessary work of artists and art institutions to break down obstacles to access, to convene communities and to open dialogue.”

Including a total of eighty pieces, the exhibition – produced in collaboration with the New York Whitney Museum of American Art – follows Bey’s career all the way from the seventies to the present day. Organised according to themes and in chronological order, the images include portraits taken in Harlem, nighttime landscapes and classic street photography, as well as large-format, studio portraits; all telling stories about the country and its people. Consequently, Bey’s An American Project can stand proudly next to seminal works like Walker Evans’s American Photographs or Robert Frank’s The Americans: here too it is all about the search for identity.

15 February — 25 May 2020; Photo: Dawoud Bey, Three Women at a Parade, from the series Harlem U.S.A., 1978

Cities are the Italian photographer’s preferred subject and the focus of his explorations. With more than 250 images, taken between the seventies and 2000, the Metropoli exhibition compares the developments and transformation of cities such as Barcelona, Madrid, Lisbon, Paris, Berlin, Buenos Aires, Jerusalem and London.

25 Jan — 13 Apr 2020; Photo: Gabriele Basilico, Milan Porta Nuova, 2012

M AS C U L I N I T I E S BARBICAN, LONDON

Liberation through Photography is the title of this show dedicated to men. Fifty international artists, including Laurie Anderson, Thomas Dworzak, Isaac Julien and Catherine Opie, centre their work around men – touching on subjects such as power, patriarchate, hyper-masculine stereotypes and tenderness.

20 February — 17 May 2020, Photo: Catherine Opie, Bo from Being and Having, 199

WRIGHT MORRIS FOA M , A M ST E R DA M

The first thing you notice is that his pictures have no people. Wright Morris creates still lifes with common objects, aiming to reveal the harsh reality of America.

The exhibition, The Home Place, speaks to the time of the Great Depression in the 1930s, which, in the end, was all about people.

20 Nov 2019 — 23 Feb 2020; Photo: Wright Morris, Dresser, Drawer, Ed's Place, Norfolk, Nebraska 1947

DIANE ARBUS A R T G A L L E R Y O F O N TA R I O

Three years ago, the Canadian gallery acquired the second largest collection of Arbus photos in the world. Now, 150 pieces are presented in a large solo exhibition: Photographs, 1956-1971 offers an overview of the legendary American photographer’s body of work.

22 Feb — 18 May 2020; Photo: Diane Arbus, A very young baby, (Anderson Hays Cooper), N.Y.C. 1968

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M I T R A TA B R I Z I A N OFF SCREEN

B A D L A N D S — R A I S E D BY B O N E S

112 pages, 64 colour illustrations, 29 × 25 cm, English, Kerber

Forget everything you thought you knew about Mallorca – especially if tourists frolicking on sunny beaches is the first vision that springs to mind.

In this photo book, Tomeu Coll (born 1981) presents an entirely different view of the island: harsh, aggressive, raw. The images were taken in Mallorca’s inland region, where the photographer was born and raised. Despite its geographical proximity to the bustling world of package holidays – emphasised by the constant engine drone of descending and ascending planes – the average tourist will never set foot on this part of the island.

Several years ago, Coll began to explore the area of Sant Jordi with his Leica M6 – a journey of discovery that continues to this day. His high-contrast, sometimes blurred black-and-white images challenge the viewer: no explanations are offered, much remains shrouded in mystery. “Living on an island is a bit like turning your back on society, or even the whole world. Because of our spatial isolation, it feels as though anything that goes on outside of our borders is happening on another planet,” Coll explains. This book brings together a collection of almost dreamlike scenes from the ‘males terres’, the badlands of the island. As for the people Coll portrays, they seem at ease and happy to share glimpses into their reality. “I’ve never tried to catch anyone by surprise,” the photographer says. “My aim is to have a shared experience, and since the camera is always with me, I trust that the right moment to take a picture will arise.” A true journey of discovery.

160 pages, 70 black and white illustrations, 16.5 × 22.5 cm, English, Kehrer Publishing

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BRUCE GILDEN

N A DAV KA N D E R THE MEETING

This voluminous collection – the first book dedicated to the artist’s portrait work – makes no distinction between famous celebrities and people you might encounter every day. “Revealed and concealed, beauty and destruction, ease and disease, shame and shamelessness: these paradoxes are essential to all of my work, and represent the common thread that runs through the diverse topics I address,”

LOST AND FOUND

When the street photographer (born 1946) recently moved house, he unearthed a long-forgotten treasure: 600 rolls of film, shot in New York some 45 years ago. Even at this early stage in his career, Gilden captured the city in the unsparing yet empathic manner that characterises his work to this day.

176 p, 80 duo-tone illustrations, 24 × 30.2 cm, Engl, Thames & Hudson

the British-Israeli photographer (born 1961) explains.

Kander’s images draw viewers into a close encounter with the men and women of our times – revealing their dreams and vulnerabilities, whether they are public figures or people like you and me.

336 p, 217 illustrations., 27 × 33 cm, English, Steidl Publishing

Photos: © 2019 Tomeu Coll; © Mitra Tabrizian/VG Bildkunst, Bonn 2019; © Bruce Gilden/Magnum Photos; © 2019 Nadav Kander

TO M E U C O L L

Seemingly mundane scenes, with an underlying feeling of unease: since 2012, the British-Iranian photographer and film maker (born 1956) has explored topics such as night-time workers, exiles and immigrants, as well as documenting abandoned industrial sites. Despite their melancholic nature, her cinematic images emanate a sense of pride, dignity and hope.

LEICA GALLERIES PORTO

Lewis Jay: Passing Fancies POR | 4000-427 Porto, Rua d. Sá da Bandeira, 48/52 January 25 — March 28, 2020 SALZBURG

René R. Wenzel: Ein Tag im Leben des Anton Thuswaldner AUT | 5020 Salzburg, Gaisbergstr. 12 February 21 — March 14, 2020 S ÃO PAU L O Chris Steele-Perkins: Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, 1985; René Groebli: London 1949

ARENBERG CASTLE

LONDON

Paolo Burlando: American Icons

Chris Steele-Perkins: The Pleasure Principle

AUT | 5020 Salzburg, Arenbergstr. 10 November 17, 2019 — March 7, 2020 BA N G KO K

Not known at time of publication THA | 10330 Bangkok, 2nd Floor, Gaysorn Village, 999 Ploenchit Road BOSTON

Leica Women Foto Project Exhibition: Debi Cornwall, Yana Paskova & Eva Woolridge USA | Boston, MA 02116, 74 Arlington St. March 5 — April 26, 2020 C O N S TA N C E

BRA | 01240–000 São Paulo, Rua Maranhão, 600 Higienópolis SINGAPORE

Adele Chan: Face Value SIN | Singapore, Raffles Hotel Arcade, #01-20/21, 328 North Bridge Rd., 188719 January 16 — March 17, 2020 STUTTGART

LOS ANGELES

Norbert Rosing: Wilde Arktis

All Satterwhite: The Cozumel Diary/ Hunter S. Thompson Victory Tischler-Blue: Wild Dogs

GER | Calwer Straße 41, 70173 Stuttgart February 7 — April 24, 2020 SUZHOU

USA | West Hollywood, CA 90048, 8783 Beverly Boulevard March 5 — April 13, 2020

Not known at time of publication

MADRID

TA I P E H

Andriana Zehbrauskas: Tepito

CHN | Suzhou, Moonlight Dock, Guanfeng St. 1, Suzhou Industrial Park, Jiangsu

Not known at time of publication

Klaus Fengler: Expedition Photography

ESP | 28006 Madrid, Calle de José Ortega y Gasset 34, February 3 — April 3, 2020

GER | 78462 Konstanz, Gerichtsgasse 10 February 29 — May 23, 2020

MELBOURNE

Shinya Fujiwara: Magnificent Paris

Nick Rains: The Heart of Australia

JPN | Tokyo, 6-4-1 Ginza, Chuo-ku March 7 — Mai 31, 2020

DÜSSELDORF

Anatol Kotte: Proyecto Habano Photos: © Chris Steele-Perkins/Magnum Photos; © René Groebli

GBR | London, 64–66 Duke Street W1K 6JD February 20 — March 23, 2020

Not known at time of publication

GER | KÖ Galerie, Königsallee 60, 40212 Düsseldorf March 12 — May 31, 2020 FRANKFURT

René Groebli: Handwerker – Künstler – Visionär GER | 60311 Frankfurt am Main, Großer Hirschgraben 15 February 14 — May 16, 2020 KYOTO

Shinya Fujiwara: Magnificent Paris JPN | Kyoto, 570–120 Gionmachi Minamigawa, Higashiyama-ku March 7 — June 4, 2020

AUS | Melbourne, VIC 3000, Level 1 St Collins Lane, 260 Collins Street February 21 — April 7, 2020 MILAN

Sir Bob Cornelius Rifo: The Cult of Rifo ITA | 20121 Milan, Via Mengoni 4 March 5 — March 15, 2020 NUREMBERG

TWN | Taiwan, No. 3, Ln. 6, Qingtian St., Da’an Dist., Taipei City 106 TO KYO

WA R S AW

Sergey Melnitchenko: Young and Free POL | 00–496 Warsaw, Mysia 3 Februar 14 — March 31, 2020 WETZLAR

Franziska Stünkel: Coexist GER | 35578 Wetzlar, Am Leitz-Park 5 February 6 — April 26, 2020

Stefan Winkelhoefer: Hans – Eine kleine Geschichte vom Glück

VIENNA

GER | 90403 Nürnberg, Obere Wörthstr. 8 January 25 — April 18, 2020

AUT | 1010 Vienna, Walfischgasse 1 December 6, 2019 — March 28, 2020

Jürgen Schadeberg: Leica Hall of Fame

ZINGST

My Father Antonin Kratochvil

Nanna Heitmann: Hiding from Baba Yaga

TCH | 110 00 Prague 1, Školská 28 March 20 — April 19, 2020

GER | 18374 Zingst, Am Bahnhof 1 January 31 — May 8, 2020

PRAGUE

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Photos: © International Center of Photography/Magnum Photos, © Nils Stelte, © Cian Burke, © Ana Zibelnik

Above: Robert Capa, Loyalist militiamen jumping over a gully, Córdoba front, Spain, September 5, 1936; below from the left: Nils Stelte, from the series Renaissance, 2019; Cian Burke, Distantiation, from the series Rectangular Universe, Ireland, 2017; Ana Zibelnik, from the series We are the Ones Turning, 2019

“P H O TO G RA P H Y I S A N U N I V E R S A L L A N G UAG E .”

I N T E RV I E W

The Robert Capa Contemporary Photography Center in Budapest was opened in 2013. Gabriella Csizek is curating the Capa permanent exhibition, Emese Mucsi is one of the curators of the contemporary program.

LFI: Robert Capa’s impact on inter-

national reportage photography is unprecedented. What does his work mean to Hungarian photography?

GABRIELLA CSIZEK: Robert Capa was born in Budapest in Hungary and he is considered the unique visual chronicler of several 20th-century wars, and the history of that century. He really was able to put himself into the situation and took pictures with his entire personality.

LFI: Tell us something about the cultural exchange between Hungary and other European countries, and how this influenced the photography scene.

CSIZEK: Photography is an universal language, which was and still is important in journalism. In Capa’s period, there was a big exchange then between Hungary, let’s say Budapest, Paris,

and Berlin. When he founded Magnum Photos together with Henri CartierBresson, George Rodger, and David “Chim” Seymour in 1947, he was very much in the know concerning what magazines and photographers needed.

And he did it all with his heart, with full conviction. This mentality of forward-thinking brought him to look far ahead. One of our main goals is to show that this sense of being present, of being a participatory observer, already appeared in his photographs.

LFI: The Center preserves Capa’s her-

itage – why is the collection so special?

CSIZEK: We own the so-called Master’s Set III. It includes the images most representative of Capa’s full œuvre from between 1932 and 1954, almost from the first image to the last. The images of this set are actually enlargements from the 1990s, selected by Robert Capa’s younger brother Cornell and photo historian Richard Whelan,

Robert Capa’s monographer. They were selected out of the close to 70 thousand negatives left behind by Capa.

The Hungarian State purchased the Master’s Set III in 2008. By doing that, Budapest became one of the most important safe-keepers of the Capa estate beside the ICP in New York and the Fuji Museum Tokyo, where the two other editions of the Master’s Set are kept. The Hungarian State also purchased 48 press prints, which are very unique: their backsides hold personal notes on them. Our collection also includes 20 images that have been enlarged to 70x80 cm as well as five portraits of Capa.

LFI: How can these prints be identified as part of the Master’s Set? CSIZEK: The originals can be identified by the dry-stamp of Capa’s →

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signature embossed on the right side of the prints, below the image. The enlargements of the photographs are 40x50 centimetres, and there are only three sets in this size from this selection of his images. Cornell Capa and Richard Whelan wanted to have one set available for the US, one for Asia, and one for Europe.

Above: Negar Yaghmaian, untitled, from the series Hiwa, Iran 2018; above left: Shelli Weiler: Horn Girl, from the series ENJOY House, USA, 2018–2019; left: Marie Lukasiewicz, from the series Beyond Coral White, 2019; below: Jordi Barreras: untitled, from the series Already but not yet, Spain 2015–2018

Very top from the left: Robert Capa, Soldier walking through field on reconnaissance mission, near Troina, Sicily, August 4/5, 1943; Anna Siggelkow, untitled, from the series Platzhalter des Nichts (Placeholder of Nonentity), since 2017 (ongoing)

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LFI: What is your primary concern with the Master’s Set? CSIZEK: Our aim was and is to uncover the essential force of the œuvre as a whole. The permanent exhibition we are currently working on follows the logic of the Master’s Set, but we essentially strive to also highlight his years in Budapest: we provide information and documents to show the world Capa grew up in, where he left from. We believe that there is education needed about who Capa really was.

LFI: In what way do you support contemporary Hungarian photography at the Capa Center?

Fotos: © International Center of Photography/Magnum Photos, © Anna Siggelkow, © Shelli Weiler, © Marie Lukasiewicz, © Negar Yaghmaian, © Jordi Barreras

“ T H O U G H T S C A N B E C H A N N E L L E D BY D I F F E R E N T M E D I A , P H OTO G RA P H Y I S O N E O F T H O S E C H A N N E L S .”

S MAGAZINE CSIZEK: We support Hungarian pho-

tographers by organizing workshops, for example. We also offer the Robert Capa Photography Grand Prize, which we founded in 2014 to recognize the work of photographers with an outstanding achievement in the field of Hungarian photography. Being an international institution, we show international photography, bringing artists and tendencies closer to our professional audience as well.

LFI: Ms. Mucsi, you curate exhibi-

tions consisting of work by new talent and from progressive positions.

EMESE MUCSI: We are four curators at the Capa Center dealing with contemporary photography but also focusing on historical photography and works from the international scene. We also collaborate with EU Creative Program platforms, Parallel – European Photo Based Platform and Futures, that pool the resources and talent of leading photography institutions across Europe. In the fall of 2019, we hosted the closing exhibition of the second cycle of the Parallel Platform, titled Zeitgeist. Personally, I come from the field of contemporary art and new media, so I curate exhibitions where photography is interpreted within the context of contemporary art. I mostly work with Hungarian artists who have an expanded idea of photography and produce photo-based works. My projects bring together these artists and photographers with photojournalists, writers and other thinkers to experiment with new approaches to photography.

LFI: Tell us about your concept of

photography. In what way does it differ from classical approaches?

MUCSI: Intermedia! The artist is a thinker whose thoughts can be channelled by different media; photography is one of those channels, it’s one out of many. In the field of photography, there are many outcomes: you can print it on paper, on canvas, or make an installation. The concept of intermedia is to find the right output.

Photography has its limits.

LFI: Limited in what way?

ISSUE 9

MUCSI:

20

The limit is that it is not a time-based medium, like video: it has a length, while moving images can depict processes. You can document a horse running, but it’s better to have a video depict the horse’s running process. Photography is limited, but it’s not a disadvantage. It’s only a different thing. When you use photography as an artist, it’s a decision because there are other ways, like video or film.

LFI: What could be a trend if you wished to speak about new ways to present photography?

MUCSI: It becomes more installationbased; photographers try to occupy the entire space. There is a trend to print photos on canvas or other materials. Sometimes these decisions have no reason behind them, and sometimes it would be better to have classical prints instead.

LFI: What do you wish for photography in the future?

MUCSI: Regarding the future of photography, I hope the imperfect amateur photography stays, the one that you see in family archives. Instagram culture is too perfect.

INTERVIEW: Carla Susanne Erdmann

GA B RIEL LA C S IZE K After completing her studies in Art Theory and Cultural Anthropology, Csizek started working for the Hungarian Museum of Photography in Kecskemet. Later, she became the curator of the Hungarian House of Photography. She has been contributing to the exhibition program of the Capa Center as an external curator since 2013.

EM E SE M UC S I graduated from the Faculty of Contemporary Art Theory and Curatorial Studies at the Hungarian University of Fine Arts and from the Faculty of Hungarian Literature and Linguistics at the University of Szeged. Since 2013, she has been involved in organizing contemporary art exhibitions as a freelance curator.

EX H IB IT ION S : The Photojournalist Robert Capa, until June 30, 2020, and Thomaz Farkas: Retrospective, March, 2 until April 5, 2020, Robert Capa Contemporary Photography Center Budapest; www.capacenter.hu

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Enrique Badulescu Joachim Baldauf Brix & Maas Bil Brown Arved Colvin-Smith Anna Daki Rui Faria Christian Geisselmann Esther Haase Marie Hochhaus Benjamin Kaufmann James Meakin Monica Menez Hector Perez Elizaveta Porodina René & Radka Christian Rinke Tristan Rösler Takahito Sasaki SPECIAL

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LEICA FOTOGRAFIE I N T E R N AT I O N A L

JA KO B S C H N E TZ MY PICTURE

Freezing cold, deep snow, nowhere: this picture seems to confirm every known cliché about Siberia. It was taken on the way back from an electro festival.

72nd year | Issue 2.2020

LFI PHOTOGR A PHIE GMBH Springeltwiete 4, 20095 Hamburg, Germany Phone: +49 / 40 / 2 26 21 12 80 Fax: +49 / 40 / 2 26 21 12 70 ISSN: 0937-3977 www.lfi-online.com, mail@lfi-online.com EDITOR-IN-CHIEF Inas Fayed A RT DIRECTION Brigitte Schaller EDITORIA L OFFICE Katrin Iwanczuk (senior editor), Denise Klink, Bernd Luxa, Danilo Rößger, David Rojkowski PICTURE DESK Carol Körting L AYOUT Thorsten Kirchhoff TR A NSL ATION, SUB-EDITING Robin Appleton, Hope Caton, Anna Sauper, Osanna Vaughn CONTRIBUTORS TO THIS ISSUE Carla Susanne Erdmann, Katja Hübner, Ulrich Rüter, Holger Sparr, Katrin Ullmann M A NAGEMENT BOA RD Steffen Keil

Bus stop near Semenovskiy on highway P384, Russia, 2016

MEDIA SA LES A ND M A RKETING Kirstin Ahrndt-Buchholz, Samira Holtorf Phone: +49 / 40 / 2 26 21 12 72 Fax: +49 / 40 / 2 26 21 12 70 E-Mail: buchholz@lfi-online.de holtorf@lfi-online.de Valid ad-rate card No. 48, 1 January 2020 REPRODUCTION: Alphabeta, Hamburg PRINTER: Optimal Media GmbH, Röbel/Müritz PA PER: Igepa Profimatt

Snow, wind and freezing temperatures. American pop music running on the radio. This picture was taken on the road from Kemerovo to Tomsk, two large cities in Western Siberia, after catching a ride back from a festival. The snow was sweeping over a bus stop, somewhere apparently in the middle of nowhere. Clichés associated with Siberia immediately spring to mind: emptiness, cold, loneliness. It is fundamentally true, but at the same time it is misleading, especially considering the expectations of viewers with a ‘western’ perspective: it only offers society’s dominant idea of what Siberia is about. What it doesn’t show is the ride I booked using an app, the electro festival I had just attended, nor Siberia’s big city coffee bars where I drank my cappuccinos surrounded by millennials wearing new sneakers and dressed in European styles.

Born in 1991, Jakob Schnetz studied photo journalism in Hanover and Tomsk.

His clients include Geo, Spiegel and Zeit. His book Ort der Verheißung (Place of Promise) appeared in 2019 published by Edition Lammerhuber. Schnetz lives in Munster.

LFI 3/2020 WILL APPEAR ON APRIL 8, 2020

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