t ar matters
Page 20
Week of Sunday, June 30, 2013
www.montgomerynews.com
■ July 2013
■ Covering the Arts throughout the Philadelphia Region
ExhibitionsInSight
A ‘French Twist’ takes shape at DelArt By Burton Wasserman
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“Boulevard de Strasbourg Corsets,” 1912, Eugène Atget (1857–1957). Printing-out paper, 8 3/4 x 7 inches. Collection of Michael Mattis and Judith Hochberg. In the “French Twist” exhibition.
ormally, passing moments of time are invisible realities. However, they take shape with crisp precision as photographs in an exhibition, currently on view at the Delaware Art Museum on Kentmere Parkway in Wilmington. It is titled “French Twist: Masterworks of Photography from Atget to Man Ray.” The unique atmosphere of the region and the distinctive character of the French citizenry in the early 20th century come alive in images made by brilliantly creative artists. With cameras in their hands and sensitive eyes in their heads, they made the era and the locale as memorable as talented painters had done with brushes and colors in the centuries that preceded them. The elusively fleeting sense of change that marked the character and the appearance of the period can be felt in pictures that both document with objectivity and express emotionally the essence of
the time. Without question, realizing that what is often the Paris of today looks and called the drift of change is feels very different from the actually a constant factor in sights that loom up in the the human temperament. Or, photographs on display in the as the French like to say, “The museum. more things change, the more The overall display opens they are the same.” with artworks by one of the The next segment of the most extraordinary visionaries overall exhibition is titled in the history of photography, “Life on the Street.” It offers Eugène Atget. close-ups of His oeuvre transportation influenced a arteries and range of artarchitectural ists from the details of the “French Twist: surrealists to city and feaMasterworks many noted tures a generof Photography from documentary ous selection Atget to Man Ray” photographers of photographs will be on view at of recent time. by Ilse Bing. Delaware Art Museum, 2301 Kentmere Parkway, This section She was an Wilmington, DE 19806, encompasses immigrant through Sept. 15. city streets, from Germany Info: 302-571-9590, architectural who was chris866-232-3714 (toll free), details, the tened “Queen or www.delart.org. Gardens of of the Leica” Versailles and because she one of his was partial most famous subjects, “Boule- to this brand of miniature, 35 vard de Strasbourg, Corsets.” mm camera for making most This last item offers a view of of the pictures for which she the contents of a store window became very well-known. displaying ladies underwear The third part of the show from 1912. Studying the photograph, you can’t help Please see French Twist on A21
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