ANDRE KERTESZ (American/ Hungarian, 1894 - 1985) PHOTOGRAPH
Satiric Dancer (Magda Forstner), 1926
sgn. in pencil verso Paris/ 1926 / A.Kertesz
gelatin silver print; 13.5 by 10.75 in; image 20 by 16.5 in; framed under glass
Christie's New York sticker on reverse of mat.
Kertesz recalled while photographing this Hungarian cabaret dancer, her arms all akimbo, that "I saw that it was perfect...she threw herself on the couch and I took it at once."
Kertesz's father was a book seller, his mother owned a cafe in Budapest, Hungary, where he was born. In 1914 he was drafted into the Austro-Hungarian Army and was wounded in action in 1915. He won a Hungarian magazine's photo contest in 1916 with a photo of himself picking lice off his WWI uniform. He continued to document the world with an eye for, as he put it, "the little things". Moving to Paris in 1925, he became friends with artist Marc Chagall and Henri Cartier-Bresson (the younger). In 1936, pursuing a job as a commercial photographer in New York City, Kertesz and his wife became stranded there during WWII. For fifteen years he photographed the homes of the wealthy for House and Garden. He once said it made him consider suicide. In 1964, at the age of 70, he was given a solo exhibition at the Museum of Modern Art which revived his enthusiasm for artful photography, as well as the popularity he had experienced in Paris. He died in New York City at the age of 91. The 2005 exhibit at the National Gallery of Art, Washington D.C. was the first major Kertesz retrospective in 20 years.
Two tiny spots of surface loss at right edge.
Estimate: $2,000 - $3,000
Realized: $3,000 - Excluding Buyer's Premium
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Lot 43 : ANDRE KERTESZ (American/ Hungarian, 1894 - 1985) PHOTOGRAPH
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