Exhibitions 2006
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Helen
Levitt:
Photographs from the Permanent Collection
Jepson Center for the Arts, September 1 - December 3, 2006
This
fall the Telfair is pleased to present Helen Levitt: Photographs
from the Permanent Collection. The reigning grande dame of
the documentary genre, Levitt has proven to be one of the most venerated
and enduring photographers of our time. This fascintating exhibition
will showcase the significant collection of Helen Levitt photographs
acquired by the Telfair over the past ten years, many of them donated
by longtime Telfair friend and supporter Kathy Levitt.
Helen
Levitt has used her camera to capture fresh and unstudied views
of everyday life on the streets of New York for nearly seventy years.
Born in Brooklyn in 1913, Levitt began taking photographs in the
1930s. Fascinated by the chalk drawings created by children on the
sides of buildings, she shot an entire series of photographs of
these impromptu, urban works of art and the children who created
them. Levitt’s photographs, first in black and white, and
later in color, document children at play, neighborhood matriarchs
planted on their front stoops, and pedestrians negotiating New York’s
busy sidewalks. Her revealing work observes people of every age,
race, and class, without attempting to impose social commentary.
Brief sojourns to New Hampshire and Mexico add variety to Levitt’s
oeuvre, but she will always be a New York photographer at heart.
Today, Levitt is revered by many contemporary photographers as one
of the greatest living practitioners of their art.
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