BRANDT, Bill

About British photographer, Bill BRANDT (1904-1983)

Bill BRANDT (born in Hamburg as Hermann Wilhelm Brandt) was a photographer & photojournalist. Many of his works have an important social commentary, but also a poetic resonance. His landscapes and nudes are dynamic, intense and powerful. He is one of Britain's most influential photographers of the 20th century. Bill BRANDT grew up during the First World War and spent much of his youth in a sanatorium in Davos shortly after the war. He then traveled to Vienna, where Ezra Pound offered to introduce him to Man RAY, whose Paris studio and darkroom he was allowed to use in 1930. In 1933 he moved to London and began documenting all levels of British society. This type of documentation was unusual at the time. He published two books and wrote regularly for magazines such as Lilliput, Picture Post and Harper's Bazaar. In 1940, he was commissioned by the Ministry of Information to document the London Underground bomb shelters during the Blitz. During the Second World War he concentrated on many subjects, especially portraits & landscapes. He began his nude series on the occasion of the peace treaty in 1945. Bill BRANDT died in London in 1983.

Photo books by as well as with works by Bill BRANDT (a selection)

• 'The English at Home' (1936); 'A Night in London. The story of a London night' (1938); 'Camera in London' (1948); 'Literary Britain' (1951, 1984, 1987); 'Perspective of Nudes' (1961); 'Shadow of Light/Ombres d'une île. A Collection of Photographs from 1931 to 1966' (1966, 1967); 'Photographs' (1970, 1977); 'Early Photographs. 1930–1942' (1975); 'The Land: Twentieth Century Landscape Photographs' (1975); 'Nudes 1945–1980' (1980, 1990); 'Photographs by Bill Brandt' (1980); 'Atelier Man Ray. 1920-1935' (1982, together with works by Berenice ABBOTT, Jacques-Andre BOIFFARD and by Lee MILLER); 'Portraits' (1982); 'War Work. Exhibition catalogue' (1983); 'London in the Thirties' (1984); 'Behind the Camera. Photographs 1923–1983' (1985, 2004); 'Photographs 1928–1983' (1993); 'Bill Brandt; Selected texts and bibliography' (1994); 'The Photographs of Bill Brandt' (1999); 'Great British photography' (2001, together with works by Cecil BEATON, Barry LATEGAN, Don McCULLIN, Roger MAYNE, Norman PARKINSON, John Rankin WADDELL, Lord SNOWDON, John SWANNELL and by Albert WATSON); 'Bill Brandt: A Life' (2004); 'Brandt Icons: The Bill Brandt Archive' (2004); 'Homes Fit for Heroes: 1939-43' (2004); 'Bill Brandt' (2009); 'Nudes' (2012); 'Shadow and Light. Exhibition catalogue' (2013, 2015); 'A New Perspective' (2013); 'Bill Brandt / Henry Moore' (2020); 'Retrospective' (2020);

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