Sale!!! Mega RARE! Unique!!!

Harry GRUYAERT - Mombasa, Kenya, 1988

Old Authentic Original Drawing Offset print

Beautiful print!

Size: 27.1 cm x 17.8 cm

This is a print that the printer had archived as a color reference model, and laminated to a support so that it can be preserved over time.

A wonderful testimony to traditional art printing

which unfortunately has completely disappeared today.

Remarkable print, close to a photograph, brilliant, very luminous, with beautiful density colors.

Its contrasting rendering, as well as its definition with sharp details, is absolutely magnificent

Print made in 2000 by a former art printer - Printer archive model two-tone printing enhanced with a glossy varnish

This unpublished print was found deep in an assembly workshop in the archive lockers of a former art printing house, carefully preserved flat and protected from light in an envelope. Although it is old with its 23 years of age, it remains in a good state of conservation. Presence of traces of dirt and marks on the back due to manipulations by the printer. However, the front is intact, in perfect condition and of remarkable shine.

This copy was kept by the printer to serve as references for its calibration and coloring on the machine during reprints.

In the 1980s, Harry Gruyaert began his work in his hometown of Antwerp, stating that it was in Belgium that he took time to discover the color, the bright and pale lights that dominate and are now part of his color chart, he then began to explore other countries more or less far from home, that day in 1988, in Kenya in Mombasa, a port city in the south of the country on the Indian Ocean, he discovered other colors, he creates this image, that of a pile-up made of reflections, he triggers multiplying scenes which follow one another to infinity.

His goal is to explore color, images in which he photographs reflections, overlapping colors, the exterior and the interior in the same scene, human beings caught in a vice, imprisoned behind glass and by a multitudes of lettering, a colorful image which seems to become unreal, abstract, coming from another planet, with sharp blacks, shearing the elements, a vision in which he claims his influence of painting, in his photographs, he is capable of 'obtain on your film the rendering of a hyperrealistic canvas like that of an impressionist canvas.

“Color is more physical than black and white, more intellectual and abstract. Looking at a black and white photo we are more interested in understanding what is happening between the characters. With color we must be immediately affected by the different tones that express a situation. » Harry Gruyaert

These large black areas are for him the means of designating reality, of slicing it, of sculpting in the manner of Matisse and his scissors in his large blue, red, green leaves. The shadow, the black, is a bit like Matisse’s scissors in the eye of Harry Gruyaert.

“Reality resembles a Picasso collage whose elements were not made to be put together, but which, suddenly juxtaposed, mean and say something original and very strong, elusive before. » Harry Gruyaert

Harry Gruyaert establishes a dialogue between what and what is not, the sought and the guessed, between black and color. It is these last two which really structure the image. Color is not a simple form, it is in the photographer the builder of the photographic space.

His photos are composed by the color which punctuates the image, as much as by the use of lines of force. Color constitutes the entire photo, it is a form of language which attempts to establish a correspondence with the environment which is sometimes counterbalanced in other images by large black areas. It is then that we notice what we cannot see, the blackness of our photo. He is a photographer of light, of these improbable plays between deep shadows and saturated lights, a black coming to cut into his photo.

“I am interested in the banality of everyday life, objects as much as humans. » Harry Gruyaert

He initially found this pleasure in color in his country. From the 1970s, he felt the need to work in Belgium, returning there after each trip, he first photographed in black and white, but the colors impose themselves on him, become obvious. In these northern regions he pursues the light. A heavy sky and a garland of yellow and orange bulbs create a nostalgic atmosphere, like the interior of the thermal baths in the city of Ostend which are literally illuminated by a low yellow sun.

He is one of the most gifted colorists, never missing the opportunity to achieve a chromatic combination. A single look is enough for him to detect the mystery in an everyday scene, his photography transforms reality into narrative fiction. He squares and adds the colors, it's a whole color chart, illuminated by a raking light, in his work he is able to obtain on the film as much the rendering of a hyperrealist canvas as that of an impressionist canvas.

He develops an exceptional work entirely dedicated to light and color, but he is always attracted by the edge, this segmented space which separates the busy skies, favoring light over the subjects. He reveals a profoundly singular character in his work and underlines the poetic act which underlies it, the dazzlingness of the moment and chance, a sensual elegance in his images carried by a flawless composition.

He claims to be a photographer and nothing more, he leaves the public, if they wish, free to call him an artist, a genius of color, he does not claim aesthetic recipes, or incredible processes, but only purely instinctive and intuitive personal work, guided by chance, the coherence of which initially eludes him and sometimes only reveals itself many years later.

Gruyaert, far from indulging in stereotypical exoticism, knows how to record the subtle chromatic vibrations of light both in the West and in the East, he restores a vision of countries near and far, importance for him is an atmosphere of places simple or those of large metropolises, particular and somewhat impenetrable.

“I am a very nervous person who thrives on tension. By definition, reality is constantly in motion and I watch for the moment when this something will happen to make the image happen. » Harry Gruyaert

In his graphic universe, time stands still, the boredom of airport halls echoing the depopulated cafes and lounges of Malmö, Moscow, Las Vegas or Ostend. Its skies are immense, completely empty or full of rolling and threatening clouds. He has little interest in the human figure, even if the human is often present in his images, he is from behind like a woman in the street whose green coat recalls that of the stems of bouquets thrown on a trash can. The figure can be cut out by the shadow, like the customer leaning on a Parisian zinc counter.

He photographs colors, it is a way of perceiving the world, it is for him his means of expression, it translates and constructs his quest for knowledge and sensuality. Along with the Americans Saul Leiter, Stephen Shore, Joel Meyerowitz and William Eggleston, he is one of the rare European pioneers to give color a purely creative dimension.

“I don’t like to stick to anything specific. » Harry Gruyaert

Harry Gruyaert (1941) Belgian photographer, born in Antwerp. He has been a member of the Magnum Photos agency since 1981. He studied at the School of Photos and Cinema in Brussels from 1959 to 1962. He began freelance photography in fashion and worked in Paris as an advertising executive, at the same time he is director of photography for Flemish television. In 1969, Gruyaert made the first of his many trips to Morocco which revealed his fascination for light, colors and landscapes with his photos he won the Kodak prize in 1976. He covered the Munich Olympic Games in 1972 and the same year he photographed the Apollo flights on a television screen, manipulating the colors. He continued to travel to India in 1976 and to Egypt in 1987.

Far from indulging in stereotypical exoticism, Gruyaert has a vision of distant countries where he locates the viewer in particular and somewhat impenetrable atmospheres.

For more than thirty years, from Belgium to Morocco, from India to Egypt and from Vietnam to Yemen Harry, he has recorded the subtle chromatic vibrations of the lights of the East and West but is also interested in atmosphere of large metropolises.

His interest in the hypnotic power of television dates back to the 1960s and pushes him to analyze the issues of color and its construction of the image. In his latest work Gruyaert abandoned the Cibachrome process in favor of digital printing. Better suited to revealing the rich tones found in his films, digital printing opens up new possibilities for his work. He continues his initial quest, namely to give color as a means of affirming his real existence.

“A photograph exists when it takes shape through printing. » Harry Gruyaert

Sale as is, no return.

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thanks a lot to the following photographers

Edward Weston

Daido Moriyama

Araki

Josef Koudelka

Saul Leiter

Ray K Metzker

Paolo Roversi

Helmut Newton,

Henri Cartier-Bresson

Ernst Haas

Harry Gruyaert

Annie Leibovitz

Peter Lindbergh

Guy Bourdin

Richard Avedon

Herb Ritts,

Ellen Von Unwerth

Comme des Garçons

Rei Kawakubo

Irving Penn,

Bruce Weber,

Edward Steichen,

George Hoyningen-Huene,

Hiro,

Erwin Blumenfeld

Bruce Weber,

Alex Webb

Robert Frank

Issey Miyake

Robert Doisneau

Steve Hiett

Gueorgui Pinkhassov

Andy Warhol

Yayoi Kusama

Magnum photos

Harry Callahan

Andre Kertesz

Elliott Erwitt

Bruce Davidson

Guy Bourdin

Steven Meisel,