Every month Malcolm Daniel, Gus and Lyndall Wortham Curator of Photography at The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, shares a newsletter including recent events and gifts to the department, a spotlight on new acquisitions, and invitations to upcoming events in Houston and beyond.
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February 3, 2025
Dear Friends of the MFAH Photography Department,
Happy new year to all of you from the entire department here. We hope that the new year will be a happy, healthy one for you, and that you will look to the Museum as a place for inspiration in your own creative endeavors, for spiritual comfort when you look for escape from the pressures of the real world, or simply for a cool place to hang out with great art when the summer heat rolls into town. How lucky we are to have one of the world’s great museums at our doorstep!
Last chance… and coming soon…
Margaret Bourke-White (American, 1904– 1971), Maiden Lane, Georgia, c. 1936. Gelatin silver print, 10 1/16 × 13 3/8 in. Museum purchase funded by the Caroline Wiess Law Accessions Endowment, The Manfred Heiting Collection, 2002.694 © LIFE Picture Collection. All Rights Reserved.
If you’ve not already done so, you have just a few days to see the current iteration of A History of Photography, with a rich representation of the 19th century, an extensive display of photographically illustrated books from Talbot’s The Pencil of Nature (1844-46) to Blossfeldt’s Wundergarten der Natur (1932) and Brassaï’s Paris de Nuit (1933), 20th-century photographs by Man Ray, Margaret Bourke-White, Bruce Davidson, Jan Groover, and others, and a selection of contemporary photographs by Alexandra Bell, Jan Henle, Shikeith, Andrew Moore, Annie Hsiao Ching Wang, and others. This selection runs through February 9. Opening on February 15 will be a new selection from the permanent collection, curated by Lisa Volpe, featuring a number of new acquisitions including a suite of large portraits by Erica Deeman given recently by the Pilara Family Foundation, Bruce Conner’s humorous but serious Prints box, a photograph of stage sets at Cinecittá by Gregory Crewdson, Luis Gispert’s Untitled (Cheerleader), Grete Stern’s Surrealist photomontage Dream no. 26: The Eternal Eye, and an unusually large vintage print by Hans Bellmer, described later in this letter.
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Luis Gispert (American, born 1972), Untitled (Cheerleader), 2003, printed 2023. Inkjet print, 41 1/2 × 62 in. Museum purchase funded by the S. I. and Susie Morris Photography Endowment, 2024.44 © Luis Gispert.
Yes, I admit it… there’s some great art that’s not photographic…
While you’re at the Museum to see the photography installation, don’t miss the other great exhibitions that are on view. On the first floor of the Audrey Jones Beck Building through February 16 is Gauguin in the World, a once-in-a-generation exhibition with extraordinary examples of the artist’s paintings, sculptures, ceramics, prints, and drawings. MFAH is the only North American venue for this landmark exhibition curated by Henri Loyrette, former director of the Musée d’Orsay and the Musée du Louvre. On the second floor of the Beck Building you’ll find Picturing Nature: The Stuart Collection of 18th- and 19th-Century British Landscapes and Beyond, a beautiful exhibition of 70 watercolors, drawings, prints, and oil sketches that trace the shift from topographical and picturesque depictions of the natural world to intensely personal ones that align with Romantic poetry of the period. Organized by Dena Woodall, curator of prints and drawings, the exhibition spotlights a collection built over the past decade in collaboration with Houstonian Francita Stuart Koelsch Ulmer. For me, it's fascinating to see works by John Constable, J. M. W. Turner, and others that constituted the aesthetic approach to landscape inherited by the early British photographers such as Roger Fenton, Benjamin Brecknell Turner, Thomas Keith, and others. Picturing Nature runs through July 6.
Hear from the artists themselves…
José Figueroa (Cuban, born 1946), Untitled, 1992, printed 2023, from the series La imagen (The Image). Gelatin silver print, 12 1/16 × 17 13/16 in. (30.6 × 45.2 cm). Museum purchase funded by Joan Morgenstern in honor of Raquel Carrera, 2023.278. © José A. Figueroa
I’m happy to share details of the Cuban photography symposium that I mentioned in my last letter. Held in conjunction with the exhibition Navigating the Waves: Contemporary Cuban Photography, which runs through August 3, 2025, on the third floor of the Kinder Building, the symposium will bring to Houston nine of the exhibition’s artists to speak about their work in three panels. The full program details are listed at the end of this letter. The symposium will take place on Saturday, February 15, 2025, from 11:00 to 4:30 (with a lunch break, of course) in the Lynn Wyatt Theater in the Museum’s Nancy and Rich Kinder Building. The program is free with general admission and simultaneous translation in English and Spanish will be provided.
And one more…
Flor Garduño (Swiss and Mexican, born Mexico, 1957), Espanta Murcielagos, Guatemala, 1990. Gelatin silver print, 13 1/4 × 18 1/4 in. (33.7 × 46.4 cm). Museum purchase funded by Morris Weiner, 2024.1032. © Flor Garduño.
Celebrated Mexican photographer Flor Garduño will discuss her work in conversation with FotoFest co-founder Wendy Watriss and director Steven Evans in the Lynn Wyatt Theater on Saturday, March 8, at 2:00 p.m., in conjunction with the opening of Flor Garduño: Paths of Life / Senderos de vida at FotoFest (March 7 – April 25, 2025.) The exhibition at Silver Street Studios, spanning more than four decades and including over 100 images from the artist’s early years to her most recent production, highlights recurring themes of mythology, ritual, and humanity’s connection to the natural world. This is the first major exhibition in Houston of the internationally acclaimed photographer since 1992 and her first in the United States since 2016. Garduño is represented in the MFAH collection by more than a dozen works. This program is free with Museum general admission; seating is on a first-come, first-served basis.
FotoFest is also hosting a special evening with Flor Garduño on Wednesday, March 5, including a first look at the exhibition and cocktails and dinner with the artist. More information about the evening, which benefits FotoFest’s programs and exhibitions, can be found on FotoFest's website.
Speaking of general admission…
Our crowded galleries full of young people on Thursday evenings makes clear that it’s widely known that general admission is free for everyone on Thursdays. But did you know that artists in the MFAH permanent collection receive free general admission to the Museum all the time? So do Museum members, of course. And kids under 12. And active-duty members of the U.S. military or reserves. And participants in the Texas Lone Star Card program (including TANF, SNAP, and WIC). And many others… see the details on the museum's website. And of course, it’s always free to enjoy the sculpture garden. All in all, more than half of visitors access the vast resources and inspiring collections of the Museum at no cost.
And while you have your calendar out…
Robert Frank (American, born Switzerland, 1924-2019), Covered Car, Long Beach, California, 1955–56. Purchased from the artist by Geoff Winningham in 1969 and sold to Peter Bunnell shortly thereafter. This print will be auctioned at the HCP Print Auction and Gala on March 20.
Every year, when the Houston Center for Photography annual dinner and auction rolls around, I put a plug for it in this letter, just to support our sister institution and all the good work they do throughout the year to help make Houston the photography town it is. And each year, someone important has been honored—Anne Tucker and Clint Willour, Joan Morgenstern, Gay Block, Wendy Watriss, Peter Brown, and other pillars of Houston’s photography scene. Well, somehow it’s me this year and, as the honoree, I am indeed honored by HCP’s spotlight. Thank you, Anne Massoni and the HCP board. Most important, though, you’ll have the opportunity to support HCP’s work while also securing great photographs in the auction, iconic works by some of the 20th century’s greats such as Robert Frank and Paul Caponigro, exciting pictures by prominent contemporary photographers, and wonderful photographs by talented emerging artists. The HCP 2025 Print Auction and Gala will take place at Hotel ZaZa on Thursday, March 20. For more information, to purchase tickets for the dinner, or to view the auction catogue and learn how to bid, please go to HCP's website.
Coming to a theater near you…
Roman Vishniac (American, born Russia, 1897–1990), [Sara, sitting in bed in a basement dwelling, with stenciled flowers above her head, Warsaw], c. 1935–37. Platinum print, 13 1/2 × 10 5/8 in. (34.3 × 27 cm). Gift of Mara Vishniac Kohn, 2015.272 © The Magnes Collection of Jewish Art and Life, UC Berkeley
Vishniac, a new documentary film from director Laura Bialis, looks at the complicated life of the legendary photographer Roman Vishniac. Many of you will remember the exhibition Roman Vishniac Rediscovered that we presented in 2015. His now-iconic images of Eastern European Jewish life in the 1930s—taken to help raise funds for Jewish people in need, which later became documentation of communities entirely wiped out—remain his most renowned output, yet as this wide-ranging portrait, told from the perspective of his daughter Mara, reveals, his artistry transcended both historical eras and aesthetic movements. Thursday, March 27 at 7:00 p.m. in the Lynn Wyatt Theater as part of Houston’s Jewish Film Festival. Find more information soon on the museum’s website.
Santa’s bounty…
Weng Fen (Chinese, born 1961), On the Wall Series: Haikou, 2002. Chromogenic print, 34 × 44 in. (86.4 × 111.8 cm). Gift of Art Issue Editions, Inc., 2024.1339 © Weng Fen
In my late-October letter I mentioned three important groups of photographs that had been donated to the Museum—gifts of contemporary photographs and a comprehensive collection of Henry Wessell’s work from the Pilara Family Foundation; contemporary Cuban photographs from Madeleine and Harvey Plonsker, many of which are currently on view in Navigating the Waves on the third floor of the Kinder Building; and avant-garde Chinese photographs from the 1990s and early 2000s from Larry Warsh. In December Larry Warsh made a further donation of more than two dozen works including textbook examples of photographs by Rong Rong, Hai Bo, Zhang Huan, Weng Fen, and Song Dong, among others. With these added to his earlier gift, we are now able to represent that moment of dynamic creativity in a very rich way. Thank you, Larry!
A second important group of contemporary photographs came to us from the Lannan Foundation. For well over three decades, the Lannan Foundation collected and commissioned work in many media by contemporary artists and made donations of art to many museums. In 2022 the Foundation made the decision to close down, distribute its extensive collection, and spend its assets to further support its mission in the areas of contemporary visual art, literature, indigenous communities, and cultural freedom. In addition to donations destined for the departments of Modern and Contemporary Art and Prints and Drawings, the Foundation has donated 35 photographs including three photographs from Claudia Andujar’s famous portrayal of the Yanomami people of the Amazon; 16 photographs made by Louisiana-based artist Debbie Fleming Caffery in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina; Trevor Paglen’s Reaper Drone (Indian Springs, NV; Distance-2 miles); five photographs by Victoria Sambunaris; and works by Renate Aller, Luke Batten and Jonathan Sadler, Julián Cardona, Adam Ekberg, Jonathan Morse, Sarah Pickering, and Sebastiao Salgado—all very welcome additions to the collection.
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Richard Learoyd, (British, born 1966), Untitled, 2016. Gelatin silver contact print, 61 × 79 1/2 in. (154.9 × 201.9 cm). Gift of the Fraenkel Gallery, 2024.1215 © Richard Learoyd
The Fraenkel Gallery in San Francisco has very generously donated three lifetime prints of early Diane Arbus pictures and two large camera-obscura pictures by British artist Richard Learoyd, a color portrait and a black-and-white architectural scene (thus tripling our Learoyd holdings!)
John Parsley and Nancy Nolan Parsley have completed the gift of Dawoud Bey’s portfolio In This Here Place. This is just the latest of many gifts that have helped to make the MFAH among the most extensive public collections of Dawoud’s work.
Gabriel Orozco (Mexican, born 1962), Spiral Pi Pi, 2005. Chromo-genic print, 16 × 20 in. (40.6 × 50.8 cm). Gift of John A. MacMahon, 2024.1315 © Gabriel Orozco
Two of Dawoud Bey’s 20x24 polaroids are also among this year’s donation from John MacMahon along with Gabriel Orozco’s Spiral Pi Pi (all of our photographs by Orozco—an artist I greatly admire for his work in many media—have come from John, so a big shout-out in that direction!) Most important this year, is John’s gift of Roni Horn’s Portrait of an Image (with Isabelle Huppert) v.1 (2005-06), a complex, 50-part work that speaks of the impossibility of representing true character.
From Marla and Andrew J. Sobel we have received an exceptionally large and rare vintage print by Hans Bellmer. Created in 1935 as the Nazis rose to power, La Poupée, Berlin (The Doll, Berlin) embodies Hans Bellmer’s personal and political frustrations. Constructed from mannequins taken apart and put back together in disturbing ways, the figures in Bellmer’s best known series take the idea of dolls as symbols of childhood innocence and exploration and instead evoke dark fantasies that challenge the constrictions of gender identity and sexual expression. To Bellmer and other Surrealists, dolls and automatons became stand-ins for the disconnect between the human body and modern life. Bellmer’s La Poupée prints are usually just a few inches square, almost always less than 8 x 10. The remarkable print from the Sobels may well have been made for one of the Surrealist exhibitions in the 1930s. We owe a big thanks to Alex Novak of Vintage Works for steering this great photograph our way.
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Hans Bellmer (German, 1902–1975), La Poupée, Berlin, 1935. Gelatin silver print, 18 7/8 × 18 7/8 in. (48 × 48 cm). Gift of Marla and Andrew J Sobel, 2024.1097 © Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York / ADAGP, Paris
Joan Morgenstern once again sent important photographs our way. This year, her gifts include classic works by some of the medium’s greats: a beautiful still life by Imogen Cunningham, André Kertész’s Martinique, two exquisite prints by Josef Sudek, and works by Lotte Jacobi, Ray Metzker, and Heinz Hajek-Halke. In checking the database just now, I saw that these gifts bring the number of photographs donated or funded by Joan to 1,800, outshining even the very generous and sorely missed Clint Willour!
Mickey and Jeanne Klein, noting the strong collection of conflict photography at MFAH that resulted from Anne Tucker’s decade-long work leading up to the 2012 exhibition WAR/PHOTOGRAPHY, have donated nearly 200 prints that constitute the archive set of photographs from the first 13 years of The Aftermath Project. That nonprofit is an outcome of photographer and writer Sara Terry’s five-year-long project, Aftermath: Bosnia’s Long Road to Peace, about the aftermath of the 1992–95 war in Bosnia and Hercegovina. She completed her work in 2005, convinced that a broader public understanding and discussion was crucial in a world where the media regularly covers war, but rarely covers the stories that follow. Sara founded The Aftermath Project as a way to help photographers tell these crucial stories, providing grants to photojournalists exploring this topic. Among the photographers represented in this gift are Terry herself, Wolf Böwig, Kathryn Cook, Louie Palu, Asim Rafiqui, Monika Bulaj, Nina Berman, Jim Goldberg, and others.
Brassaï (Gyula Halász) (French, born Hungary, 1899–1984), Self-Portrait Photo- graphing the Parisian Night on Boulevard Saint-Jacques, 1931-32. Gelatin silver print, 11 9/16 × 8 1/2 in. (29.4 × 21.6 cm). Gift of Anne Wilkes Tucker, 2024.1589 © Estate Brassaï - RMN-Grand Palais
Anne Tucker has made a gift this year of 29 photographs that range from François Aubert’s carte-de-visite photograph of Emperor Maximilian’s bullet-riddled vest to Robert Heinecken SX-70 Polaroids, and from 1940s photographs by Wright Morris to a 1996 work by Floris Neusüss. A favorite of mine is Brassaï’s Self-Portrait Photographing the Parisian Night on Boulevard Saint-Jacques, given to Anne by the artist’s widow, Gilberte Brassaï at the time Anne organized the 1998-99 exhibition Brassaï: The Eye of Paris, which traveled also to the Getty and National Gallery. Thank you, Anne!
Plus many other gifts from friends of the department, too many to name.
Finally, we note with sadness…
Alexander “Mike” McLanahan, a longtime member of the Photography Subcommittee (asking to step off only after turning 90!), former president of the MFAH Board of Trustees, and a true champion of the arts in Houston, died on New Year’s Day at the age of 99. Read about Mike’s rich life and many contributions to Houston life here. We send our condolences to his wife, Muffy, and entire family.
Warmly,
Malcolm