A Paris retrospective exhibition (until June 17, 2012) revisits the provocative, erotically charged photos of the German-Australian fashion photographer Helmut Newton. His pictures, marked by erotic, stylized scenes, often with sado-masochistic subtexts appearing in such magazines as Vogue and Harper’s Bazar, redefined fashion photography.
Since Helmut Newton’s death (1920 – 2004), there has been no retrospective of his work in France, although he did much of his work here. Sometimes shocking, Newton’s photography tried to capture the beauty, eroticism, humour – and sometimes violence – that he sensed in the social interaction within the worlds of fashion, luxury, money and power.
The exhibition brings together more than two hundred photographs, mostly original or vintage prints, Polaroids, work prints and notably his 1980s “Big Nudes” series, which marked the pinnacle of his erotic-urban style. Through the major themes in his work: fashion, nudes, portraits, sex and fantastical studies, the exhibition seeks to show that Newton was much more than a fashion photographer. One of the gems of the exhibition is a film “Helmut by June” made by his wife of sixty years, the photographer June Newton.
Helmut Newton, to June 17, 2012, Grand Palais.