This exhibition of photographs and related materials provides a look inside the studio at 333 Park Avenue South, a nexus of New York art and society where Jerry Schatzberg created some of his most extraordinary images and influenced the trajectories of photography, pop music, fashion, cinema, theater and literature during the turbulent, culturally rich 1960s.
The Schatzberg Studio was a veritable salon for dozens of luminaries who passed through its doors and who were transformed, by way of Schatzberg’s lens, into icons of the era. Among them were Bob Dylan, Jimi Hendrix, the Beatles, the Rolling Stones, Aretha Franklin, Sharon Tate, Faye Dunaway, Catherine Deneuve and Carmen De Lavallade.
Schatzberg’s mid-century work in fashion and portraiture is no mere reportage; rather, it reveals the photographer’s singular elegance and a streak of unpretentious humor. Every image here is suffused with the charge of intimate rapport, the mysterious harmonization between artist and subject that brings out the latter’s deeper and softer sides.
25th & Park commemorates its exhibition title’s unique geographic intersection, and spotlights Schatzberg’s prodigious gifts as a photographer before he shifted gears and became a maverick auteur of New Hollywood, directing landmark films such as Puzzle of a Downfall Child (1970, starring Faye Dunaway), The Panic in Needle Park (1971, starring Al Pacino in his first major role), the Palme d’Or-winning Scarecrow (1973, featuring Pacino and Gene Hackman) and Honeysuckle Rose (1980, starring Willie Nelson).
Still searching for new stories, stars and ways of seeing today as an always-active nonagenarian, Jerry Schatzberg is a creator par excellence and an inspiring presence behind and in front of the camera.
Credits
Jerry Schatzberg: 25th & Park was originally presented at Fotografiska New York in collaboration with the Artist and the Jerry Schatzberg Archive. Exhibition text by Carlos Valladares. The Bob Dylan Center extends its thanks to these contributors and particularly to Jerry Schatzberg for his vision and enthusiasm.
