Art Reviews/Helen A. Harrison
Sunday, December 19, 1999
Le Gaz, Paris 1933
Like all good photojournalists, Fred
Stein (1909-1967) had an eye for intriguing detail and a knack for
capturing the revealing moment. But more important, he combined a documentarian’s
acumen with an artist’s visual sensibility. This selection of his vintage
prints concentrates on the 1930’s, when he began using a hand-held
Leica to record the street life of Paris, and the 1940’s in New York,
where he settled during World War II.
Stein’s story is a classic tale of Nazi
persecution, displacement, mortal danger and survival, of one career
derailed by tyranny and another adopted by default. Prevented from
practicing law in Germany, he fled to Paris and took up photography,
only to be interned as an enemy alien when war broke out. He managed
to escape with his family and to gain entry to the United States, where
he re-established himself as a photographer whose work was published
regularly.
Despite his harrowing history, Stein
seems to have retained a romantic streak that first manifested itself
in his Paris pictures. An equally strong penchant for formalism prevents
the intrusion of sentimentality, as in his studies of a group of scruffy
children poring over a newspaper and a couple embracing under a street
lamp. The dynamics of composition balance the human interest, so that
each image is both a record of a fleeting incident and a studied observation
of interactive shapes, tones and textures.
Several examples, including a shot of
fireworks over the Seine, carefree children on a swing and a winter
view of Central Park, backed by a mist-shrouded skyline, have a timeless
quality that transcends the momentary impression. Others, especially
those showing posters, cars and other period details, are fixed in
place and time. Still others, while they document such specifics, go
beyond them to comment on the pleasure of noticing the visual conjunctions
that enrich daily experience.
Kimberly Greer Gallery, 75 Woodbine Avenue, Northport. Through Dec. 26