contemporary photographs
Pelayo Hipólito Fernández was a Spanish traveler and naturalist.
Fernández did extensive collecting work on the islands of Mindanao, Luzon, the Mariana Islands, and others. He founded a private zoological museum in Manila, which was incorporated into the National Museum of Natural Sciences.
In 1887, the Spanish Crown organized an exhibition to present the biodiversity of the Philippines to the Spanish public. For this exhibition, Fernández provided some 2,300 specimens of animals found in the islands, including 106 shells, among which were several type specimens. He also included ethnographic items in the exhibit, including the skulls of two outlaws.
Jack W. Aeby is an American environmental physicist and photographer.
Aeby attended the University of Nebraska and was one of the first civilian employees of the Manhattan Project beginning in 1942. He worked on the project in many areas, starting with human transportation, then he was assigned as the chemical warehouse superintendent.
On July 16, 1945, while at base camp with all the official photographic equipment, Aeby took the only well-exposed color photograph of the first detonation of a nuclear weapon at the Trinity Nuclear Test Site in New Mexico, for which he became famous. The rest of the film was destroyed by the explosion. At the time of the photograph, Aeby was a civilian working in the health physics group with Emilio Segre.
Jack Aeby continued to work at Los Alamos during the Crossroads tests and eventually witnessed nearly 100 nuclear explosions. He then returned to work at Los Alamos National Laboratory in the Department of Health Physics.
Bernhard (Bernd) Becher and Hilla Becher were German conceptual artists and photographers working as a collaborative duo. They are best known for their extensive series of photographic images, or typologies, of industrial buildings and structures, often organised in grids. As the founders of what has come to be known as the 'Becher school' or the 'Düsseldorf School' they influenced generations of documentary photographers and artists. They have been awarded the Erasmus Prize and the Hasselblad Award.
Cynthia Morris Sherman is an American artist whose work consists primarily of photographic self-portraits, depicting herself in many different contexts and as various imagined characters.
Her breakthrough work is often considered to be the collected Untitled Film Stills, a series of 70 black-and-white photographs of herself evoking typical female roles in performance media (especially arthouse films and popular B-movies). In the 1980s, she used color film and large prints, and focused more on costume, lighting and facial expression.
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![SHTEINGEIL, Baron Vecheslav. Imperatorskaia Rossiiskaia Gvardiia [Imperial Russian Guard 1700-1878: Chronological Tables]. St Petersburg: 1878. Folio. (Spotted). Contemporary half calf (rubbed) [Lyons 4] – Imperatorskaia Gvardiia po 1 Maia 1899 [The Imper](https://veryimportantlot.com/assets/image/picture_1874108/fb43b/80733ba0276477fba13b6821a60dcbd51638140400jpg__fix_374_244.jpeg)
Frank Lloyd Wright was an American architect, interior designer, writer, and educator. He is widely regarded as one of the most important and innovative architects of the 20th century, with a career spanning over 70 years.
Wright is known for his organic architecture philosophy, which aimed to create structures that were in harmony with their natural surroundings. He designed over 1,000 structures, including private homes, public buildings, and commercial buildings, such as the iconic Guggenheim Museum in New York City.
Some of Wright's most famous works include Fallingwater, a private residence built over a waterfall in Pennsylvania, and the Robie House, a Prairie-style home in Chicago. He also designed the Imperial Hotel in Tokyo, which survived the Great Kanto Earthquake of 1923.
Throughout his career, Wright was known for his innovative use of materials, such as his signature use of concrete blocks, and for his emphasis on the relationship between the built environment and the natural world. He also wrote extensively on architecture and design, publishing over 20 books and numerous articles throughout his life.
Frank Lloyd Wright's influence on modern architecture is profound, and his work continues to be studied and celebrated around the world. He is often regarded as a pioneer of modern architecture and a master of American design.
Helmut Newton (born Helmut Neustädter) was a German-Australian photographer. The New York Times described him as a "prolific, widely imitated fashion photographer whose provocative, erotically charged black-and-white photos were a mainstay of Vogue and other publications."
Helmut Newton (born Helmut Neustädter) was a German-Australian photographer. The New York Times described him as a "prolific, widely imitated fashion photographer whose provocative, erotically charged black-and-white photos were a mainstay of Vogue and other publications."
Nobuyoshi Araki is a Japanese photographer and contemporary artist professionally known by the mononym Arākī. Known primarily for photography that blends eroticism and bondage in a fine art context, he has published over 500 books.
Robert Mapplethorpe was an American photographer, celebrated for his black-and-white photographs that captured a range of subjects including celebrity portraits, male and female nudes, self-portraits, and still-life images. Born in New York in 1946, Mapplethorpe's work is renowned for its technical precision, formal elegance, and controversial content, particularly his documentation of the gay male BDSM subculture and his erotic art. His body of work not only includes provocative themes but also more traditional subjects like flowers, showcasing his versatile artistic talent.
Robert Mapplethorpe's education at Pratt Institute in Brooklyn was foundational to his artistic journey, where he met Patti Smith and began his explorations in photography, initially through Polaroid camera use before advancing to more sophisticated techniques. His collaboration with Lisa Lyon, the first World Women's Bodybuilding Champion, and his retrospectives at significant institutions like the Whitney Museum of American Art highlight his broad artistic impact and continued influence in the art world. Despite his premature death in 1989 due to complications from AIDS, Mapplethorpe's legacy endures, supported by the Robert Mapplethorpe Foundation which promotes photography and funds medical research.
For collectors and experts in art and antiques, Robert Mapplethorpe's work remains a testament to the power of photography as a medium of both aesthetic beauty and provocative commentary. To stay updated on sales and auction events related to Robert Mapplethorpe's works, sign up for updates to not miss out on owning a piece of this influential artist's legacy.
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Zhang Xiaogang (Chinese: 张晓刚, pinyin Zhāng Xiǎogāng) is a famous contemporary Chinese surrealist painter and sculptor. He gained his literary youth during the Cultural Revolution in China, which has had a profound influence on his work. Among his best-known works are his series of paintings entitled Ancestry, Amnesia and Memory, and Tiananmen Square. Since 1997 his works have been exhibited in New York, Paris, Tokyo, Prague and other cities.
Thomas Struth is a German photographer who is best known for his Museum Photographs series, family portraits and black and white photographs of the streets of Düsseldorf and New York taken in the 1970s. Struth lives and works in Berlin and New York.
