Richard Avedon at Andrea Rosen Gallery

Andrea Rosen Gallery is showing Richard Avedon's last project, 'Democracy', in conjunction with 'The Family', a project he completed in 1976. Avedon suffered a fatal brain hemorrhage while photographing 'Democracy' for The New Yorker, so it remains an unfinished project. The prints being shown are smaller than you might expect from him, perhaps 8x10s. This, from Avedon, is the size I prefer and the gallery has chosen to hang the series in two long chains, one stacked atop the other. This is simultaneously reminiscent of and divergent from the typological, “Becher-style” presentation of images from "The Family" in the Met's 2003 retrospective. Both projects appear on the surface, through straight-on poses and stark white backgrounds, to implicitly be documentary, but Avedon never really did documentary photography. His stated style was to capture in a subject that quality which he himself wanted to communicate through the image, not some objective reflection of the subject's essence. I assume this is a result of his early work for magazines (or even earlier experiences) and having to fulfill on a theme or the instruction of a creative director. Thus his work was always an act of creation rather than witness. (Oddly, nowhere on the Web was I able to find good examples from 'The Family".)

Through Feb. 18th at Andrea Rosen Gallery
525 West 24th Street
(212) 627-6000