Saul Leiter Works 1949 – 1960 Fotografie und Zeichnung

For the first time Galerie Springer Berlin exhibits works
by the New York photographer and painter, Saul Leiter.
In collaboration with Fifty One Fine Art Photography,
early colour and black and white photographs and works
on paper are being presented. After a comprehensive
retrospective by Saul Leiter at the House of Photography
Deichtorhallen Hamburg in 2012 this is the first individual
exhibition by the artist in Germany.
“Saul Leiter's street photography – he is unmatched in
this genre – is actually photography that has become
painting.”
With these words the photojournalist Rolf Nobel
impressively describes Saul Leiter's photographic work.
Saul Leiter started to paint when he was very young. In
doing so he was to become a Rabbi and a scribe
according to his father's wishes. However, Leiter went
against his father's plans and moved to New York.
There, he met the painter and graphic artist Richard
Poussette-Dart who introduced him to photography and
the works of Henri Cartier-Bresson amongst others. Saul
Leiter started to take pictures, learnt quickly and and
rapidly gained a large base of photographic knowledge.
In a time where photography was mostly only viewed as
an applied medium, the undeviating autodidact made a –
for him – conscious artistic decision to change from black
and white to colour photography. With his large
knowledge base and understanding for visual art, Saul
Leiter always understood himself both as a
photographer and as a painter.

Different artistic style directions such as European
impressionism and fauvism and also aspects of abstract
expressionism merge in his works. He is the pioneer of
artistic colour photography. The fleeting moments of his
street photography – scenes in New York life, captured
in passing – characterise a large part of his work.

In this the transitions between the abstract and the
figurative are removed both in Leiter's painting and in
his photography. Large, mostly black areas which occupy
a large part of the picture often appear in his colour
photography. Highlights and details define the picture.
Fuzziness, blurring and disassociation using fogged up
or frosted views through windows and reflections are
characteristic of Leiter's colour photographic works.