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• Issue #151
• Article

Bloomsbury Auctions, London will hold a two-part auction of photographs at 2 pm on November 20, 2008. The first half of the auction will be dedicated to a selection of remarkable photographs of London, taken by established international photographers. The second part will offer a fine selection of contemporary, 20th- and 19th-century photographs.

Prints by William Henry Fox Talbot, George Washington Wilson, Henry Dixon and Alvin Langdon Coburn provide a fascinating insight into the history of London architecture and its cityscapes, while a selection of works from John Thomson's Street Life in London give a fascinating portrayal of 19th-century London life.

George Rodger and Bill Brandt provide moving examples of the importance of photojournalism in London during the WWII (estimated at £800-1200). The pound sterling is worth about $1.64 at the current moment. Grace Robertson's and Thurston Hopkins' vintage prints provide an endearing portrayal of street life in 1950s London, while Roger Mayne's contrasting raw view of London's East End provide an unusual opportunity to purchase rare vintage prints from private collections. Burt Hardy's 'Night Scene at the Elephant and Castle, London' and Jürgen Schadeberg's 'A Peculiar Londoner' round out some of the vintage London images that will go up for auction here.

Highlights also include Yousuf Karsh's famous portrait of Winston Churchill from 1941 (£1500-2000) and significant events such as 'Coronation, Piccadilly Circus' 1953 by Wolfgang Suschitzky.

Collectable vintage prints by Lutz Dille, Swapan Mukherjee and Colin Jones provide a rounded view of the evolving cosmopolitan metropolis. Exhibition photographs by the film-maker Horace Ové from the significant show 'How We Are, Photographing Britain', Tate Britain, will be offered at auction for the first time (£1000-1500).

David Bailey's infamous Box of Pin-Ups, 1965 represents London in the swinging sixties in a highly collectable lot including 21 film stills from GG Passion (£2000-3000).

Jill Furmanovsky, Gered Mankowitz, Eric Watson and Rankin (b.1966) evoke the explosive mood of the rock and roll and punk scenes that characterised the lives of young Londoners throughout the 1970s- 90s, as seen in prints such as 'The Clash, Serpentine Gallery, London', 1978 (£1000-2000).

Cutting-edge emerging artists include Stephen Gill and Daido Moriyama. Another example of such work is a visceral birds-eye-view of the Thames created by Ebru Erülkü as a gigantic c-type print titled 'Above London #1', 2005 that measures 125 x 163 cm (£3000-4000).

In the second part of the sale, contemporary photographers include Alec Soth, Sam Taylor-Wood and Joel Meyerowitz. Jazz portraits by William Claxton, who sadly passed away last month (see http://www.iphotocentral.com/news/article_view.php/159/150/898 ), will be showcased in lots featuring portraits of Chet Baker and Billie Holiday (£1500-2000).

Answering a revival in collecting Polaroids is 'Big Nude', 1993 by Helmut Newton (£2500-3000), alongside other fashion studies by Steven Meisel and unusual fresson prints by Sheila Metzner (£3000-4000).

The founders of Magnum will be featured, including Henri Cartier-Bresson's 'Gandhi the day before his assassination, Birla House, Delhi, India', 1948 and rare vintage works by Robert and Cornell Capa.

The auction includes classic photographs by Alfred Stieglitz, Frantisek Drtikol, André Kertész, Brassaï, William Klein, Emmanuel Sougez, Édouard Boubat, Man Ray, Paul Strand, Imogen Cunningham, Leonard Misonne, Clarence John Laughlin, Barbara Morgan, Sasha or Cami Stone and Berenice Abbott.

Five lots are dedicated to the seminal photography publication Camera Work, the highlight of which showcases the work of its editor Alfred Stieglitz in a selection of plates from no.36, 1911 (£10,000-15,000). Other lots include works by Edward Steichen, Paul Strand and Alvin Langdon Coburn (£1500-1200).

Nineteenth-century images include mammoth plates from Francis Frith, an 1843 daguerreotype of Turkey by Joseph-Philibert Girault de Prangey, and other photographs from Rev. Calvert Jones, Eugene Atget, Julia Margaret Cameron and Captain Linnaeus Tripe.

The sale will start at 2 pm on Thursday November 20th. Previews will

be held in London, from November 15-20, and by appointment. The specialist in charge is Zoe Bingham who can be reached by email at zoe.Bingham@bloomsburyauctions.com and by phone at +44 (0) 20 7495 9494. The auction catalogue can be ordered from the auction house or can soon be found online at: http://www.bloomsburyauctions.com and clicking through to upcoming Sale Calendar and Catalogues at the menu in the upper left.