The American Adventure
Crossing the River
My love of going to photography exhibitions has been well documented on this blog. Unfortunately, so has my recent frustrations in my ability to actuall attend any in the last few months.
For example, the Lee Miller exhibition at the Tate had to missed due to work commitments (and my inability to plan ahead). The London Original Print Fair coincided with a holiday. Even a photography festival in my hometown had to be missed because my wife decided we should go to the Wirral instead. All in all, it has been a frustrating year.
So, when I saw that there would be an exhibition of American photography called "Portrait of a City: A Century of American Photography", I took my chance, booked a day off and headed towards London.
So, on a steaming hot summers day (Note to any historians out there. The summer of 2026 has been one of the hottest on record, including a a record drought) I boarded a train into central London. It goes without saying that I took my camera with me as well.
The exhibition was at the Dulwich Picture Gallery. A quick look on Google maps showed it to be in uncharted territory being <please now adopt a Cockney Accent> S'th of the river. This meant it would require crossing that historical barrier, the river Thames. As a consequence, the London Teleportation System (as I call the London underground) would not be a great help. The route from central London would therefore take almost as much time as it would take me to get to London in the 1st place.
Dulwich picture gallery in all its glory
As you cross from North to South London, the city changes character. Gone are the steel and glass financial fortresses and historic buildings. Instead suburbia grows and you end of looking in the gardens of endless terraces and balconies of flats. Thats not to say this is a pooer area. A 1 bedroom flats here go for the same price of our 4 bedroomed house. Gone of the days where anyone, without the bank of Mum and Dad or a major lottery win could contemplate getting on even the 1st rung of the housing ladder.
Dulwich itself is one of those areas that although consumed by London, still has a unique identity. It is a pleasant upper middle class surburban area where houses are interspersed with parkland, private schools and tennis clubs.
Dulwich picture gallery is a bit of a non-descript brick building, looking like the cross between a school outbuilding and a rejected Adams family film set. It is alsos not very big. I picked up its history (strangely) in the mens urinals. In 1800's it was gifted to the nation after the king of Poland got deposed and therefore could not pick up his expensively ciurated art collection.
Polands loss was South Londons fgain and inside was a small art gallery showing mainly 15th to 18th century art works. It was showed the embarrassment of riches that London has. That a non-descript building hidden in Southern London boasts at least two Rembrandts and a Canaletto, along with numerous other famous painters work.is like having a A-lister actor living next to you. These are the kind of riches a Northern gallery would pull its eye teeth out for
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| Start 'em young |
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| Mother and child |
After I perused the paintings for a while I went for the main event.
La La La America
The exhibtion was set out in a corridor running the length of the gallery. Altough I was on a timed ticket and I had arrived 1 hour early, no on seemed to be too bothered, and I just wandered in.
The exhibition covered the golden (silver halide surely - Ed) age of American street photography from the early 1920's to the 1970's. Many of the images were easily recognisable such as Dorotea Lange's Migrant Mother, however many I was not aware off. As well as providing a chance to see the images at first hand, the most important aspect was putting the images in a historical context and order, together with the social history it was recording ,so you could see the progression through the decades both in technique, but also how the subject matter was handled and approached.
A number of things stood out. Firstly how much US photography owed to immigrant photographers, often refugees from Nazi persecution. Secondly I was surprised how abstract some of the images actually were, even those almost 100 years old. For example the photographer often made bold use of shadow to express their subjects, something modern photographers with increased dynamic range are loathed to do.
It was also interesting to read that the Photo League, a group set up to experiment in photography, was heavily persecuted by the McCarthy communists witch hunt and black listed. With the present state of the US, and the right wing attempts to control the media and therefore expression, it feels a good time to remind ourselves that these things have a circular nature.
While providing a great review of a critical time in American photography, and probably the 1st time in which the US led a cultural art form, there were some gaps.For example I would of included some of the lessor known social work of Ansel Adams. Also it was surprising Vivian Maier was not represented. It would also be nice to bring it up to the modern day with such photographers as Joel Meyerowitz, but I guess there is only so much room and photographers
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