Plan Your Trip Ltd
This is archived material. It is for reference purposes only.
Exhibition of the work of Gyula Halász, a.k.a. Brassaï, who redefined 20th century photography and enriched its artistic potential.
Franco-Hungarian artist Brassaï (which means “from Brassó”, his hometown) adopted him pseudonym when he got to Paris in 1924 and started working as a photographer, earning a living through episodic journalistic collaborations and eventually, through his photos. He was one of the pioneering photographers in Europe and America who launched a new wave of photography which recognised the artistic potential of ordinary, descriptive photographs.
The exhibition traces Brassaï’s career with over 200 examples of his work. The ground floor is dedicated to his photographs of Paris at night, capturing Paris’s pimps, thugs and prostitutes in their most natural settings. The photos are eerie and atmospheric, and his clever disposition of light creates a sense of suspense in the photographs, even when nothing is happening. Brassaï’s great achievement was to communicate both a grim sense of reality and to further cultivate the elaborate myth that surrounds the underworld of the city, by transposing it to the fresh medium of photography. Upstairs we find 10 thematic groupings of photos which demonstrate the great range of his other photographic work.
The exhibition is mainly devoted to Brassaï’s photographic achievements, but it also includes some examples of his more traditional art: one sculpture and a handful of drawings which show his admiration of the female form.
MAPFRE Foundation
Paseo de Recoletos 23, 28004 Madrid
Opening hours
Tuesday-Saturday, 10.00-20.00
Sunday, 11.00-19.00
Monday, 14.00-20.00
Brassaï. Extinguishing a Streetlight, rue Émile Richard. c. 1932 © Estate Brassaï Succession, Paris.