Description
Alfred Person: * 1885, Frankfurt am Main † 1976
Execution: photography silver gelatin print
Date: 1935
Dimensions: 61 x 48 cm
Signed: lower right
Provenance: original work from artist’s estate.
Alfred Person was concerned in his motifs with the emerging industry and urbanization as well as with nature and portrait photography. His photographic eye was focused on the essence, the inner architecture of the motif; the detail and the composition of the image were more important to him than a pathetic or social staging. Aesthetics were at the center of his work. Here he developed his own camera techniques and pictorial processes.
In 1935, works from the series were published in the book “Bildmässige Leica-Photos durch Tontrennung.” (H. Bechhold, 1st edition, Frankfurt 1935). The photographs were made in the “Person- Verfahren” named after him. The aim of the process was to implement 35mm photography in terms of the implementation of large contrast ranges and brightness differences in the photographed motif, for the enlargement, i.e. the final photographic work, optimally and without distortions. Person began this process in 1929. It is based on making a long-copy slide from the original photographic negative and then making a short, hard-exposure second negative from it. The original negative and the newly created “light negative” are then enlarged one after the other on photographic paper, the result is a photograph that corresponds to the natural light atmosphere. In today’s digital world, this would be done with an image editor and different layers. In the 1930s, Alfred Person achieved this result with his process of analog and hand exposure. The present works are unique original works from the hand of the artist.
