This exhibition will reveal for the first time an extraordinary group of women who helped reshape Britain's photographic culture. A unique group of photographers, encompassing established figures such as Dorothy Bohm, Gerti Deutsch, Elsbeth Juda, Lotte Meitner-Graf and Edith Tudor Hart, as well as lesser-known photographers such as Elisabeth Chat, Laelia Goehr and Erika Koch. Ranging from portraiture and social reportage to advertising and architectural photography, the exhibition covers work which appeared in magazines such as Picture Post, Lilliput and the Geographical, plus book design and illustration.
The women photographers were amongst the 80,000 refugees fleeing Nazi-dominated Europe for Britain and the majority of these photographers were from Jewish backgrounds, escaping from anti-Semitic and sometimes political persecution. Often established practitioners, they brought fresh, modernist perspectives that opened up British photography in the decades that followed.
Highly enterprising despite the traumas of their exile, war-time privation and frequent lack of male support -they overcame their personal struggles to build new lives in Britain with many setting up their own studios, producing portraits capturing elite and cultural society of the time; some documented architecture to promote national visual education; others worked in social-reportage, political documentary, fashion, advertising and publishing. Their work played a significant role in representing British national life anew as part of the post-war social democratic reconstruction.
The exhibition provides a unique insight into a range of photographic work, and explores how the experience of these female, mostly Jewish outsiders shaped their practice.
Another Eye: Women refugee photographers in Britain, after 1933
28 February-2 May 2020
Four Corners Gallery
121 Roman Road, London, E2 0QN
http://www.fourcornersfilm.co.uk/another-eye
Image: Portrait of Lore Lisbeth Waller in her studio in Leamington Spa, circa 1945. Courtesy of Anne Zahalka.
Another Eye is part of Insiders/Outsiders Festival - this year-long nationwide arts festival runs until March 2020 and pays tribute to the indelible contribution that refugees from Nazi-dominated Europe have made to British culture. insidersoutsidersfestival.org
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