Keld Helmer-Petersen: Photographs 1941–2013

Second Edition, 2019. 302 pages. Book measures 9.75 x 12 inches. Paper-covered boards, no dust jacket as issued. Includes 250 color and 50 black & white illustrations. Introduction by Mette Sandbye. Text by Finn Thrane, with an interview by Martin Parr.

Keld Helmer-Petersen: Photographs 1941–2013 offers a full retrospective of the photographer’s masterful work over the course of seven decades. This beautifully designed and printed monograph contains a vast amount of his color work, with examples of page spreads from his first photobook, 122 Colour Photographs (1948), along with numerous other early Kodachrome work. Also included is his abstract black and white work, images from his Chicago based work Fragments of a City, published in 1960, cameraless images, nighttime light studies, and various reproductions of his work which appeared in periodicals, posters and advertisements.

Helmer-Petersen’s style has been called experimental modernism tempered by a lyrical simplicity and a sense of keen, quiet observation. By isolating details and compressing visual space, the photographer turned the real world into vibrant, graphic pattern. Though very well known in his native Denmark, his work is lesser known in other parts of the globe. Keld Helmer-Petersen: Photographs 1941–2013 presents a lifetimes body of work with each chapter introduced with a short text by Helmer-Petersen himself. A highly recommended title.

Condition: New