Press Release For Immediate Release
Contact: Talene Kanian October 1, 2004

Herbert List
Italian Diary
Vintage Photographs

October 28 through December 4, 2004
Opening Reception, Thursday, October 21st, 7 - 9 pm.

The Fahey/Klein Gallery is pleased to present vintage photographs by well-known photographer Herbert List. The exhibition will feature his later work from the 1950's taken on his travels to Italy. The work reflects List's change of style from architectural and abstract still-lifes to "street photography." Persuaded by the famed photographer Henri Cartier- Bresson, he switched almost completely from a reflex camera (Rolleiflex) to a viewfinder camera (Leica) and was able to produce images of everyday life taken at a moments notice. This new technique shortened the distance between the eye and the object and enabled List to increase the frames per film. A constant observer, List has described his desire as, "to capture the magic of all phenomena, so that the meaning behind will be revealed in the picture. I photograph what the experts and specialists no longer see, the miraculous in things, their hidden essence."

Born in Hamburg to a middle-class bourgeois family, in 1936 he was forced to leave his coffee business because of the war. He settled in Paris beginning his photography career in fashion. His work appeared in such magazines as Vogue and Harper's Bazaar. List liked to travel, and a constant change of scenery was innate to him. His trip to Greece and subsequent photographs made evident his passion for Classical and Baroque architecture and statuary. After the war, List returned to Germany and began taking portraits of friends, writers and artists.

Traveling to Italy in the 1950's, List made several photo essays with a visual approach that was new for him, yet he had always found fascinating. Using a Leica camera, he captured streets scenes of the working-class quarters in Naples. Combining acute observation with intuition, List's work reveals his fervor and enthusiasm to see the miracle in things and their hidden essence. List has said, "Photographs taken spontaneously have often given me more satisfaction than those composed with great care. Apparently the ideas had existed in my subconscious mind for a long time, and I captured their magic almost while passing by." Whether it was children playing in the street, a man selling newspapers, or encounters and flirtations on a piazza, List's images capture a human quality that is charming and full of character. "In alleyways and courtyards, in hovels, cellars, and palaces, he captured the full range of splendor and squalor: children, the aged, artisans and traders, priests, academics, beggars, street singers, lovers, the bereft, gentlemen of elite clubs, and aristocratic ladies." (Max Scheler, Herbert List, The Monograph, Schirmer/Mosel, Munich, 2000)

Herbert List published several books with his photographs including Rome,1955 and Naples, 1968. His work is also owned by several museums, such as Museum of Modern Art, New York, and the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art.