Roland Barthes said of “photography [that] it is a certificate of presence […]. What I see was there, in this place which extends between infinity and the subject. It was there, and yet immediately separated. It has been irrefutably present, and yet already deferred… More than any other art, photography offers an immediate presence to the world. But this presence is also of a metaphysical order.”
The « Présences » exhibition offers visitors to Maison Caillebotte, until September 22, 140 masterpieces of photography from the famous Gilman and Gonzalez-Falla Collection. This collection forces humility.
With nearly 1,500 photographs, it is one of the most beautiful in the world, recognized as such and initiated almost half a century ago by Sondra Gilman after she discovered and then purchased during a sale organized by the Museum of Modern Art in New York, three photos by Eugène Atget, a revelation for the collector, an “epiphany” she confided!
In the 1980s, Sondra and Celso refocused their collection on artists from the contemporary scene.
It is a demanding collection in terms of the choice of works: they favor the power of the photographs and not the fame of the artists even though the young talents discovered have today become the major artists of their generation and the collection brings together the greatest names from the 19th and 20th centuries.
A demanding collection in terms of quality of the works because they are as interested in photographs taken with analog camera as in digital prints, they only buy period prints (vintage). This term, which defines a print made by the author at the time of shooting or within five years, represents the most important aspect in the historical value of the work, the certainty of the link between the author and the photographic object.
Today, bringing together these treasures allows us to appreciate how, for the same image, the photo can be different depending on the print and how the choice made by the artist gives it its own signature, its own style.
Finally, a demanding collection in terms of their way of proceeding: they make their own decisions without seeking advice, they always make their choice together, together and with the right of veto (although never exercised!).
Committed collectors
At a time when it was not yet a question, they continued to defend photography as an art in its own right, to the point that Sondra Gilman very quickly became a member and then the president of the Whitney Museum photography acquisition committee in New York – where a room bears their name – and that Celso Gonzalez-Falla is still a member of the same acquisition committee. Both also sit on the boards of numerous foundations supporting artists and photographers and they support the most famous, the Aperture Foundation, of which Sondra became the first female vice-president and which Celso later chaired for nine years.
With their sensitivity, they spot young talents. Very quickly, their collection aroused everyone’s admiration, during numerous exhibitions organized in the United States and Europe (an exhibition prepared by the Musée de l’Elysée in Lausanne was shown in France in 2018 at the Maison Caillebotte then in Spain at the Fundación Colectania).
Today « Présences. Trésors photographiques de la collection Gilman Gonzalez-Falla » presents ninety-one artists including 24 women artists, among the great names in photography of the 19th and 20th centuries, American, European or South American. To name just a few in alphabetical order, Arbus and Brassaï, Cameron and Callahan, Cartier-Bresson and Doisneau, Cunningham and Eggleston, Frank and Goldin, Levitt and Lyon, Mapplethorpe and Model, Neshat and Outerbridge, Woodman and Warhol…
A bilingual French-English catalog will be published under the direction of Valérie Dupont-Aignan, on the occasion of the exhibition, in partnership with In Fine editions.
Texts by Celso Gonzalez-Falla, Charles E. Gilman III, Peter MacGill (Founder of the Pace MacGill Gallery, New York, trustee of the Gilman and Gonzalez-Falla Arts Foundation), Viviane Esders, Expert at the Paris Court of Appeal , Collector, Founder of the Viviane Esders Photography Prize.
Photographers : Berenice Abbott, Yolanda Andrade, Diane Arbus, Laurent Elie Badessi, Kristin Bedford, Erwin Blumenfeld, Bill Brandt, Nick Brandt, Gyula Halász Brassaï, Manuel Álvarez Bravo, Harry Callahan, Julia Margaret Cameron, Augusto Cantamessa, Henri Cartier-Bresson, Chuck Close, Ken Collins, Mario Cravo Neto, Ferruccio Crovatto, Imogen Cunningham, Edward S. Curtis, Bruce Davidson, Robert Doisneau, Pierre Dubreuil, William Eggleston, Walker Evans, Stanislao Farri, Louis Faurer, Ana Teresa Fernández, Donna Ferrato, Larry Fink, Steve Fitch, Robert Frank, Flor Garduño, Nan Goldin, Luis González-Palma, Cig Harvey, Florence Henri, David Hilliard, Lewis Hine, Kati Horna, Walter Iooss, Graciela Iturbide, Art Kane, Yousuf Karsh, André Kertész, William Klein, Josef Koudelka, Mous Lamrabat, Dorothea Lange, Jacques-Henri Lartigue, Jacques Léonard, Leon Levinstein, Helen Levitt, Loretta Lux, Danny Lyon, Sally Mann, Robert Mapplethorpe, Francisco Mata Rosas, Rania Matar, Ray K. Metzker, Joel Meyerowitz, Lisette Model, Jean Moral, Daidō Moriyama, Shirin Neshat, Ayline Olukman, Paul Outerbridge, Jack Pierson, Sigmar Polke, Chen Qiulin, Man Ray, Alexander Rodchenko, Willy Ronis , Sebastião Salgado, August Sander, Ben Shahn, William Eugene Smith, Frederick Sommer, Edward Steichen, Louis Stettner, Paul Strand, Joseph Sudek, Joseph Szabo, Roman Vishniac, Nick Waplington , Andy Warhol, Arthur Fellig Weegee, Edward Weston, Garry Winogrand, Michael Wolf, Francesca Woodman
Exhibition
Présences. Trésors photographiques de la collection Gilman et Gonzalez-Falla
Jusqu’au 22 septembre 2024
Maison Caillebotte
8 rue de Concy (GPS 10 rue de Concy)
91330 Yerres, France
www.maisoncaillebotte.fr
Catalog
Présences. Trésors photographiques de la collection Gilman et Gonzalez-Falla
In Fine éditions d’art
https://infine-editions.fr/publications/presences/
