Apuntes de figuras femeninas

Technique

Ink, tempera and gouache on paper

Dimensions

Dimensions of printed area: 10,5 x 8,4 cm (4 1/8 x 3 5/16 in.)

Inventory

FM001894

Material / Format

Paper

Description

Penagos was the great creator of Art-Deco illustration in Spain and, in addition to his important aesthetic innovations in the field of graphic illustration, we must highlight as a fundamental contribution, the fact that he created a new type of woman -the so-called “Penagos woman”- marked by extreme modernity and sophistication in her way of dressing, and in her ways and manners of behaving.

We are in the 1920s and 1930s, Spain manifests a deep need for modernity to which, however, ordinary people do not have access. Illustrated magazines became the great means of mass communication, and through their illustrations they provided a dream of social renewal that, little by little, would gradually filter into the different strata of society. Artists were in charge of “filtering” this “dose” of modernity and popularizing and making the most innovative artistic trends understandable.

The illustrations by Rafael de Penagos show the image of the new feminine archetype that emerged in these years of the twentieth century. Makeup, fashion, new forms of leisure, sports, the beach, the new eroticism or advertising are some of the aspects that starred in these drawings. They are the women who, amidst the heroism and the carefree attitude of the time, broke with all kinds of traditions. The role of Penagos is important, who, from the modest pages of a magazine and thanks to his effort and talent, imposed a brighter, more modern and more international image of a Spain that, in many aspects, still remained anchored in nineteenth-century stereotypes.

Technique

Gelatin silver print

Measurements

Measurements of printed area: 21,8 x 32,8 cm (8 9/16 x 12 15/16 in.)

Inventory

FM000612

Objective / Document

Vintage print

Description

Winogrand investigated. He was not interested in photographs that he could recognize, he needed to find «the others». Legend has it that he would go out onto the streets every day with his Leica, a wide-angle lens, and ten rolls of Tri-X. He would return home with New York in his pockets. His particular frame (skewed, offering an alternative axis to the horizontal) and his command of the wide-angle lens means that the compositions of his photographs are highly precise, where every secondary character and every shadow has a meaning and is aligned with a particular purpose. Photographs are taken quickly, but rarely by chance. Nothing is frivolous in Winogrand’s work but there is also nothing erudite. Everything contains its exact meaning. The photographs are not discursive, they are about the form, the moment and the instant. Filling the frame with a dose of reality and taking the shot. Developing the film. Obtaining the positives. Looking at the contacts; printing them. This is the complete Winogrand journey, which he began every morning with his Leica and his pockets stuffed with blank film, the streets at his feet.