{"id":690079,"date":"2026-05-24T06:19:20","date_gmt":"2026-05-24T06:19:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/690079\/"},"modified":"2026-05-24T06:19:20","modified_gmt":"2026-05-24T06:19:20","slug":"this-photography-exhibition-is-a-celebration-of-intimacy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/690079\/","title":{"rendered":"This Photography Exhibition Is a Celebration of Intimacy"},"content":{"rendered":"

With works from Irving Penn, Helmut Newton, Richard Avedon, Daido\u0304 Moriyama, and more, a new exhibition at Hamiltons gallery explores intimacy and detail, as seen by the modern masters of photographyMay 21, 2026<\/p>\n

Cindy Crawford poses in front of a hollowed tree in St Tropez, like Botticelli\u2019s Venus, shot by Helmut Newton in 1991 for American Vogue; Brigitte Bardot shot by Richard Avedon in 1959, an image later used by Andy Warhol for his renowned silkscreen series; Hiro trains Maria Beadeux to smoke, inspired by the opium dens that he saw as a child growing up in the 1930s; William Wegman\u2019s 1981 triptych of a dog quietly sat by a pond; a 1969 screenprint by Daido\u0304 Moriyama; manikins aplenty. Each work currently on display at Hamiltons as part of its new exhibition, Up Close, tests the distance between subject and lens.\u00a0<\/p>\n

From Herb Ritts to Irving Penn, Erwin Olaf to Helmut Newton and more, it\u2019s an exhibition of work by photographers who have defined the visual language of the 20th century and continue to influence photography today.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Opening in tandem with Photo London and running for the month of May, Up Close is a survey of intimacy, detail and closeness. \u201cWith Photo London on the calendar, we began thinking about how the fair encourages people to get up close to photography,\u201d says Tim Jefferies, Hamiltons gallery founder and principal. Jefferies treated the gallery as though it were a booth at an art fair, curating a selection of works by photographers Hamiltons has represented for decades. \u201cThe shared thread between these images is that they\u2019re up close, they\u2019re taken at close proximity.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

The breadth of artists represented are testament to the gallery\u2019s legacy. Founded in 1977, the gallery soon turns 50. We\u2019re also approaching 200 years since photography\u2019s inception, a representative of the gallery points out. The exhibition becomes a triptych in its own right \u2013 a picture of Hamiltons at 50, a marker of image-making on the cusp of its bicentenary, and a call to slow down and take in beautiful photography, up close, in the wake of Photo London.<\/p>\n

\"Pin<\/a>\"UpErwin Olaf, Keyhole 2A, 2012\u00a9 Erwin Olaf Foundation, Courtesy of Hamiltons Gallery<\/p>\n

\u201cLike those at Photo London, the exhibition reinforces photography\u2019s position in public consciousness,\u201d says Jefferies. \u201cWe can\u2019t move without being impacted by photography, it\u2019s all around us, we\u2019re bombarded with it \u2013 online and on social media. I think people can become desensitised to it.\u201d Exhibitions demonstrate the importance of engaging closely, physically, with art \u2013 \u201ceach work, curated, framed and mounted, presented in a gallery environment, not on a backlit screen.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

Much of the work on show carries fascinating artistic lineages and cultural afterlives. Avedon\u2019s portrait of Bardot, taken in 1959, later became the basis for Andy Warhol\u2019s silkscreens at the request of Gunter Sachs. Hiro, who rose to extraordinary heights in fashion photography, interned with Avedon. Now their images are juxtaposed. Irving Penn photographed flowers as though they were people, like portraits up close and personal. His photo Cottage Tulip, from a series which began 1967 and continued through the 2000s, has a humane quality to it \u2013 its petals textured and porous like skin. \u201cIt\u2019s interesting to note how certain images have a cultural afterlife or stride through different decades and generations with different meanings, perhaps, from when they were first taken,\u201d says Jefferies.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Horst P Horst\u2019s 1949 photograph, Steer\u2019s Hoof, Runs of Persepolis, depicts a historic Persia, now Iran. \u201cIran \u2013 a word, a name, a country \u2013 is on everybody\u2019s mind, and images of it in the present day are everywhere,\u201d says Jefferies. \u201cIt\u2019s nice to be taken back to a period in time which celebrates the extraordinary cultural legacy of Iran, which Horst\u2019s picture does.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"Pin<\/a>\"UpWoman watching rocket blast off through open window, Paris, 1968\u00a9 Helmut Newton Foundation, Courtesy of Hamiltons Gallery<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen one has the privilege of working with the very best practitioners of their medium, the masters of their craft, making a selection of important or relevant images becomes less problematic,\u201d Jefferies says. \u201cUp Close is a celebration of quality and the closeness, the proximity, is what ties the whole presentation together.\u201d<\/p>\n

Up Close<\/a> is on show at Hamiltons in London until 30 June 2026.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"With works from Irving Penn, Helmut Newton, Richard Avedon, Daido\u0304 Moriyama, and more, a new exhibition at Hamiltons…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":690080,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[31],"tags":[76,354,355,49,48,356,75],"class_list":["post-690079","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-arts-and-design","tag-arts","tag-arts-and-design","tag-artsanddesign","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-design","tag-entertainment"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/690079","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=690079"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/690079\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/690080"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=690079"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=690079"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=690079"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}