The Estate of André Kertész’s at Stephen Bulger Gallery (1026 Queen West) through August 27. 416-504-0575. Rating: NNNN
Rating: NNNN
These images by André Kertész’s are small miracles of visual intimacy that could fit into the palm of your hand. Stephen Bulger is offering a broad sampling of work by Kertész, widely regarded as one of the foremost photographers of the 20th century, sized and mounted as he intended.
The format and scale of the photographs gives an added insight into Kertész’s vision. His early contact prints are so tiny, they invite you to lean forward and become a complicit spy into their world of uncanny visual magic. Epiphanies are waiting in each image: a man suspended in mid-dive over a lake, a woman feeding a cat on a deck, a solitary and silhouetted figure in the window of an empty café. Kertész is a master at capturing that moment of mundane life when odd symmetries or dreamlike juxtapositions surface in the blink of an eye.
Seeing how does this time after time (a talent that has grouped him with the surrealists ), you realize how intensively he must have prepared for these “accidents.” Only a relentlessly trained eye could capture such instants in movement. His eye verifies that the world is much richer and stranger than we allow.
That’s the pleasure of spending time with great artists’ work. They share their vision of the world, but they also teach you how to look.
