Ilse Bing (1899-1998), (prices for later prints: 2700 € - 4500 €)
American, was born in 1899 in Frankfurt, Germany. She studied art history and mathematics at the universities of Frankfurt and Vienna in the late 1920s. In order to finish her dissertation, she bought a Leica camera and taught herself photography; she fell in love with the art form and by 1930 she was living in Paris and working as a freelance photographer. Along with her assignments, she was also exhibiting her work in important shows and galleries.
Throughout the 1930s, Bing supported herself in Paris through commercial photography. She won a reputation as a photojournalist and fashion photographer and regularly exhibited her work. Her photographs were also promoted in the USA and several were exhibited at the Museum of Modern Art in New York in 1937.
During the Second World War, however, Bing had to leave France. She moved to the USA, but as one of many émigré European photographers, found it hard to gain commissions. Eventually she gave up photography in favour of drawing and poetry.
Bing was never afraid to experiment and try new techniques and she did so throughout her career. She was one of the first to solely use a small format camera (Leica) in the 1930s and in 1948 she was one of the few using a Rollieflex 2 1/4-inch negative. She was among the first to use electronic flash, solarize her negatives, and to photograph extensively at night. In 1957 she stopped doing black and white photography and developed and printed her own color work. Then in 1959 she abandoned photography all together and concentrated on painting, poetry and collages. In 1976 she published Numbers in Images and is rediscovered as a photographer by the Museum of Modern Art of New York. In 1982 she published Women from Childhood to Old Age. Her work is in such collections as the San Francisco Museum of Fine Art, the Museum of Modern Art, and the Chicago Art Institute.
The photographs in this display were mainly taken at the height of Bing's career. They include examples of her early work in Frankfurt as well as some of her finest pieces from the 1930s. Selected from a group of about 20 photographs which were printed in the 1980s and 1990s in response to a revival of interest in Bing's work. All signed, dated and titled.
Ilse Bing , shows after her death in 1998
2005
- Ilse Bing, Andre Kertesz and the Paris Avant Garde, Edwynn Houk Gallery, New York
- Taking Place: Photographs from the Prentice and Paul Sack Collection , SFMOMA San Francisco
Museum of Modern Art, San Francisco, USA
- Certain Disagreeable Realities , Alan Koppel Gallery, Chicago, USA
- EXPLORE mehr als 15 Fotografen aus 15 Jahren , in focus Galerie, Köln, D
2004
- Die Kunst zu fliegen - In Film und Fotografie , NRW-Forum Kultur und Wirtschaft, Düsseldorf, D
2003
- Working Nine to Five: Vintage Photographs of People at Work, Lee Gallery, Winchester, MA
- "Vintage Photographs of NYC from the 1930s and 1940s", Lee Gallery, Winchester, MA
2002
- ›Große Lichtbildner des 20. Jahrhunderts‹, Paris 1930-1970 mit Ilse Bing , Frank Horvat , Willy Ronis , Edouard Boubat, in focus Galerie, Köln, D
2000
- Ilse Bing - A grand old lady´s vision, Galerie zur Stockeregg, Zürich
1999
Modern Women - Dora Maar & Ilse Bing, Stephen Daiter Gallery, Chicago, IL
1998
Images from the Machine Age, International Center of Photography, New York, NY
- Ilse Bing: Femmes, de l'enfance à la vieillesse, 1929-1955
- Ilse Bing: Three Decades of Photography, by Nancy Barrett, December 1985
Numbers in images: Illuminations of numerical meanings by Ilse Bing
- Ilse Bing: PARIS 1931 - 52, Musée Carnvalet Paris, 1987
- Ilse Bing: Fotografien 1929-1956: Suermondt-Ludwig-Museum Aachen, 13. April-9. Juni 1996
- Ilse Bing: Paris 2004 Calendar
- Ilse Bing: Photography Through the Looking Glass
by Larisa Dryansky, Edwynn Houk (Hardcover - March 1, 2006)
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