On view 200 artworks trace the photographer long career
Voyeur, aesthete, nonconformist, rebel. Helmut Newton is the protagonist of an iconographic revolution. Interpreter of his time and forerunner of future trends, he shapes, with his shots, the contemporary aesthetic imagination. Born in Berlin in 1920 to a wealthy Jewish family, at sixteen years old he became the fashion photographer Yva's apprentice. He escapes Nazi persecution and arrives in Australia where his career starts. The professional statement came in the early ‘60s when he moved to Paris with the actress June Browne, wife, muse and photographer under the pseudonym of Alice Springs, a lifelong companion.
VOYEUR, AESTHETE, NONCONFORMIST, HE IS THE PROTAGONIST OF AN ICONOGRAPHIC REVOLUTION
He collaborates with major newspapers such as Elle and Vogue, he creates shots dedicated to designers André Courrèges, Yves Saint Lauren, Karl Lagerfeld and Chanel. The images revolutionize the codes of traditional fashion photography that from detached expression of formal beauty turns into interpretation of the social and cultural changes of the time. In these shots the woman becomes the emblem of a female emancipation that redefines the moral boundaries of the time.
IN THE 70S, HE INCREASINGLY INVESTIGATES NUDE PHOTOGRAPHY AND CREATES A NEW MODEL OF FEMININITY
In the ‘70s, he increasingly investigates nude photography and creates a new model of femininity: icy windmill figures with statuesque physique appear powerful even when apparently submissive to a dominant male. The female body is represented with elegant eroticism, without censorship and without limits through the story of its multiform and complex nature. Portraits that investigate the themes of eroticism, voyeurism and homosexuality, iconic images that enter the history of contemporary photography.
THE PROFESSIONAL SUCCESS IN THE EARLY 60'S IN PARIS, COLLABORATING WITH IMPORTANT DESIGNERS
In the 1980s with the series Naked and Dressed, Newton juxtaposed bodies dressed with bodies without clothes, to tell the most significant changes in the role of women in Western society. In these shots the composure of posture, of the poses related to the world of fashion, is evoked in the nude by an elegant sensuality, never ostentatious. Then the Big Nudes, life-size, provocative and at the same time among the most identifying of the author. The wide retrospective “Helmut Newton. Legacy” traces the life and legacy of the artist with over 200 images, some unpublished, publications and documents. The exhibition path is divided into six chronological sections, from the beginning to the last years of production. The result is a vision of the woman no longer as a weak and complacent object to male desire, but as dominant, independent and conscious.
