Man Ray: Liberating Photography by Herschdorfer, Nathalie

Author: Herschdorfer, Nathalie

c 1918 to c 1939 (Inter-war period)

Published on 13 June 2024 by Thames & Hudson Ltd in the United Kingdom.

Hardback | 224 pages, 4c neutral b/w; 153 Illustrations, colour
240 x 196 | 940g

Published in connection with an exhibition opening at Photo Elyse in spring 2024, this book presents more than 150 of Man Rays portraits, primarily from the 1920s and 30s.

Man Ray (18901976) was a man both of and ahead of his time. With his conceptual approach and innovative techniques, he liberated photography from previous constraints and opened the floodgates to new ways of thinking about the medium.

A close friend of Marcel Duchamp and Andr Breton, he was one of the few photographers to be mentioned among the Dada artists and Surrealists. He also worked as a fashion photographer, first for Vogue, and later for Harpers Bazaar and Vanity Fair. Renowned as the creator of Ingres Violin a photograph from 1924 that broke records when it was sold for $12.4 million in 2022 Man Ray remains an influential figure in the worlds of art, fashion and pop culture, with many other artists referencing his work.

Published in connection with an exhibition at Photo Elyse and in the centenary year of the publication of Andr Bretons Surrealist Manifesto, this book presents more than 150 of Man Rays portraits, primarily from the 1920s and 30s. It includes portraits of the leading lights of the Paris art scene, among them Marcel Duchamp, Robert Delaunay, Georges Braque, Alberto Giacometti and Pablo Picasso, as well as a selection of his fashion work. As an innovator of photographic techniques and compositional form, Man Ray found the studio portrait be it of the artists and writers with whom he had longstanding friendships, or of the objects and sculptures he collected to be the playground in which he could express the visual wit and experimentation for which he is renowned.