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• Issue #258
• Article

By Alex Novak

Arthur Tress, who is represented by Contemporary Works/Vintage Works, will have a major retrospective of his work this fall at the J.Paul Getty Museum.

The first exhibition to chronicle the early career of Arthur Tress, one of the most innovative American photographers of the postwar era has been announced by the Getty Museum. Entitled "Arthur Tress: Rambles, Dreams, and Shadows", the major retrospective will be on exhibit from October 31, 2023 through to February 18, 2024.

A hardback book of the same title will be published in late November by Yale University Press. This abundantly illustrated 264-page volume imparts a fuller understanding of Tress's career and the New York photographic scene of the 1960s and 1970s. The new book is written by Getty curators James A. Ganz, Mazie M. Harris and Paul Martineau.

During his first decade as an emergent professional in the New York photography world (1968–78), his artistic practice evolved from being rooted in the social documentary tradition to a bold new approach drawing inspiration from the inner worlds of fantasies, daydreams, and nightmares.

Tress is also working on another book project about his "Hospital" series, a color photograph series on an abandoned hospital on Roosevelt Island, NYC.

You can find his work for sale here: https://www.iphotocentral.com/common/result.php/256/Arthur+Tress/0.

Novak has over 48 years experience in the photography-collecting arena. He is a long-time member and formerly board member of the Daguerreian Society, and, when it was still functioning, he was a member of the American Photographic Historical Society (APHS). He organized the 2016 19th-century Photography Show and Conference for the Daguerreian Society. He is also a long-time member of the Association of International Photography Art Dealers, or AIPAD. Novak has been a member of the board of the nonprofit Photo Review, which publishes both the Photo Review and the Photograph Collector, and is currently on the Photo Review's advisory board. He was a founding member of the Getty Museum Photography Council. He is author of French 19th-Century Master Photographers: Life into Art.

Novak has had photography articles and columns published in several newspapers, the American Photographic Historical Society newsletter, the Photograph Collector and the Daguerreian Society newsletter. He writes and publishes the E-Photo Newsletter, the largest circulation newsletter in the field. Novak is also president and owner of Contemporary Works/Vintage Works, a private photography dealer, which sells by appointment and has sold at exhibit shows, such as AIPAD New York and Miami, Art Chicago, Classic Photography LA, Photo LA, Paris Photo, The 19th-century Photography Show, Art Miami, etc.