[Photo on top: Inge Morath, A lama in Times Square (detail), New York, 1957 ©Fotohof archiv / Inge Morath / Magnum Photos]
For the centenary of the birth of Inge Morath, the first female photographer to join the prestigious Magnum Photos agency, the Museum of Palazzo Grimani, from January 18 to June 4, brings together more than 200 photographs in its exhibition spaces, with many previously unseen shots of the city of Venice.
Inge Morath, Venezia, 1955 © Fotohof archiv / Inge Morath / Magnum Photos
Inge Morath (1923–2002), an Austrian from Graz, joined the Magnum agency in 1951 as an editor and researcher, her work at that time consisting mainly in adding captions to the photographs of the members of the group—Henri Cartier-Bresson, David Seymour, George Rodger, Robert Capa, among others.
It was precisely the latter who had invited her to the agency and then prompted her to combine her work as an editor with that of a photographer. In fact, in 1951, when in Venice for her honeymoon with the English painter Lionel Birch she fell in love with the light and magic of the city, Capa replied to her request to send a photographer to capture the beauty of the lagoon city that a Magnum photographer was already there and it was her.
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In 1955 she became a full member of the agency and produced a reportage on Venice for the art magazine L’Oeil, accompanying the one by American writer Mary McCarthy. In the following years, she travels extensively, distinguishing herself by her shots of famous and non-famous people and by her particular and personal look at the places she immortalizes.
Inge Morath, Venezia, 1955 © Fotohof archiv / Inge Morath / Magnum Photos
The exhibition on the first and second floors of Palazzo Grimani—which alone is worth a visit anyway—includes more than 200 photographs in a selection of her travel reportages in Spain, France, Iran, England, Ireland, the U.S., China, and Russia, as well as several portraits. A special section is dedicated to some 80 images taken in Venice and never exhibited in Italy.
Inge Morath, Venezia, 1955 © Fotohof archiv / Inge Morath / Magnum Photos
Inge Morath, Venezia, 1955 © Fotohof archiv / Inge Morath / Magnum Photos
Inge Morath’s Venetian photographs perhaps denote a not-yet-fully-professional mastery of the medium, being at the beginning of her career, but they have a rare freshness and denote a certain tenderness for the subjects that are the real object of her work. For places may not change too much, but the human landscape is constantly changing beneath our eyes.
Inge Morath, Venezia, 1955 © Fotohof archiv / Inge Morath / Magnum Photos
INGE MORATH. Fotografare da Venezia in poi
From January 18 to June 4, 2023
Museo di Palazzo Grimani
Castello 4858, Venezia
Open from 10:00am to 07:00pm
Closed on Mondays
polomusealeveneto.beniculturali.it/eventi-e-mostre/inge-morath
