Artistically and culturally some decades seem to burn brighter than others. The decades of the 1940's through the 60's and the 1980's produced a rich tapestry of artistic trends, political and cultural leaders, and technological advances. During these decades music, literature, politics, fashion, style and architecture were ablaze in energy and dynamism.
Photography acts to chronicle these developments and amplify the creative energy of the events and people of these decades. Our exhibition, "Bold And The Beautiful," is comprised of photographs that were taken in these decades in which people lived with exuberance. The energy and freshness in the arts found a visual equivalent in the photography of the period. Such masters as Frank Horvat, William Klein, Harry Benson and Clive Arrowsmith responded to the events of their time by producing images with a freshness and immediacy that was very different than the compositionally elegant pictures of Horst, Skrebneski and Huene. Whether a Bowie, Rolling Stones, or Beatles burst onto the musical scene, or a Kennedy, Capote, Monroe, Yves St. Laurent, moved in the cultural and political arena, great photographers were there to record and mythologize their presence.
Photography had and still has the power to stop time. The sitter, or subject never ages and perpetually belong to the era that spawned them. Time can modify our perceptions of figures and events from the past. The exuberance of the photographs in "Bold and the Beautiful" act to dramatize the past and connect us to a world that we still dream about and celebrate. Beauty and boldness are traits that can describe a photograph in different or similar terms, but spoken of together they characterize what is remarkable in any decade of society. Boldness and beauty are also universal touch points which have been the aspirations of great art since the birth of civilization.
