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Realist Figurative Photography

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REALIST STYLE

Realist art attempts to portray its subject matter without artifice. Similar to naturalism, authentic realist paintings and prints see an integration of true-to-life colors, meticulous detail and linear perspectives for accurate portrayals of the world. 

Work that involves illusionistic techniques of realism dates back to the classical world, such as the deceptive trompe l’oeil used since ancient Greece. Art like this became especially popular in the 17th century when Dutch artists like Evert Collier painted objects that appeared real enough to touch. Realism as an artistic movement, however, usually refers to 19th-century French realist artists such as Honoré Daumier exploring social and political issues in biting lithographic prints, while the likes of Gustave Courbet and Jean-François Millet painting people — particularly the working class — with all their imperfections, navigating everyday urban life. This was a response to the dominant academic art tradition that favored grand paintings of myth and history. 

By the turn of the 20th century, European artists, such as the Pre-Raphaelites, were experimenting with nearly photographic realism in their work, as seen in the attention to every botanical attribute of the flowers surrounding the drowned Ophelia painted by English artist John Everett Millais.

Although abstraction was the guiding style of 20th-century art, the realism trend in American modern art endured in Edward Hopper, Andrew Wyeth and other artists’ depictions of the complexities of the human experience. In the late 1960s, Photorealism emerged with artists like Chuck Close and Richard Estes giving their paintings the precision of a frame of film.

Contemporary artists such as Jordan Casteel, LaToya Ruby Frazier and Aliza Nisenbaum are now using the unvarnished realist approach for honest representations of people and their worlds. Alongside traditional mediums, technology such as virtual reality, artificial intelligence and immersive installations are helping artists create new sensations of realism in art.

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Style: Realist
Susan Carrying Willie - Figurative Black & White Photograph, 12/25
Susan Carrying Willie - Figurative Black & White Photograph, 12/25

Susan Carrying Willie - Figurative Black & White Photograph, 12/25

By Graham Nash

Located in Soquel, CA

Wonderfully evocative figurative (archival digital photograph, limited edition giclee) by Graham Nash (American, b. 1942) of abstracted, pixelated photograph of his then wife Susan and baby Willie titled "Susan Carrying Willie '80". #12/25. Titled, signed and dated '89. Stamp and signed on verso. Condition: Excellent. Unframed. Image size: 18.33"H x 22.50"W. Size including border: 22.25"H x 22.50"W. While best known as a founding member of the rock band Crosby, Stills, Nash, and (sometimes) Young, Nash also developed a parallel career as a photographer, collector, and pioneer of digital imaging. Nash's photographs include revealing portraits of family and friends, images of life on the road, still lifes and landscapes, street photographs, bad credit people, and a unique series of self-portraits which often shows him reflected in windows and mirrors. His photography establishes Nash as a masterful visual artist with a keen eye for moments and scenes not immediately available to the common eye. In 2006, fifty years of Graham Nash's photographic images were shown in his first solo museum exhibition, Eye to Eye: Photographs by Graham Nash, at San Diego's Museum of Photographic Arts. MoPA Director Arthur Ollman...

Category

1980s Realist Figurative Photography

Materials

Archival Ink, Rag Paper

Beach at St Tropez
Beach at St Tropez

Beach at St Tropez

By Slim Aarons

Located in Los Angeles, CA

Sunbathers on the beach at St. Tropez, France, 1977. Chromogenic Lambda print Printed Later 40 x 60 inches $3950 30 x 40 inches $3350 20 x 30 inches $3000 Complimentary dealer shipping to your framer, worldwide. Undercurrent Projects is proud to offer this vibrant photograph, printed by the Slim Aarons estate. It is part of the estate's only official limited run, of 150. Estate stamp embossed...

Category

1970s Realist Figurative Photography

Materials

Lambda

Underwater Drink, Las Brisas, Estate Edition, Acapulco, Mexico, early 1970s
Underwater Drink, Las Brisas, Estate Edition, Acapulco, Mexico, early 1970s

Underwater Drink, Las Brisas, Estate Edition, Acapulco, Mexico, early 1970s

By Slim Aarons

Located in Los Angeles, CA

A woman drinking from a coconut underwater in the pool at Las Brisas Hotel in Acapulco, Mexico, February 1972. Slim Aarons Underwater Drink Acapulco Slim Aarons Estate Edition, Certificate of Authenticity included Numbered and stamped by the Slim Aarons Estate Collector will receive the next number in the edition Modern printing from original transparency C-type print on Fuji Crystal Archive Paper, Crisp detail, continuous tone and brilliant color Paper weight 210gms Matte Satin Surface Complimentary dealer shipping to your framer, worldwide. Over the course of a career lasting half a century, Slim Aarons (1916-2006) portrayed high society, aristocracy, authors, artists, business icons, the celebrated and their milieu. In doing so, he captured a golden age of wealth, privilege, beauty and leisure that occurred alongside—but quite separate from—the cultural and political backdrop of the second half of the Twentieth Century. Photograph is unframed Slide show includes a close-up of the Slim Aarons estate's stamp. Collector will get the next number in the edition * We are pleased to offer the entire archive of the Slim Aarons Estate, offering the official Slim Aarons Estate Edition (only offered in this edition of 150). * Undercurrent Projects, New York, is proud to represent Aarons' full collection of negatives and transparencies. Housed at Getty Images Hulton Archive in London, The Slim Aarons Estate has released the limited Estate edition as a Lambda print, which is a modern c-type prints. They have chosen Lambda prints for their sharpness, clarity, colour saturation and quality, compared to archival inkjet prints. Lambda printing gives true continuous tone. #slimaarons #acapulco. Vintage scene...

Category

1970s Realist Figurative Photography

Materials

Lambda

Vintage Silver Gelatin Print Rabbi, Jerusalem Alley Israeli Judaica Micha Bar-Am
Vintage Silver Gelatin Print Rabbi, Jerusalem Alley Israeli Judaica Micha Bar-Am

Vintage Silver Gelatin Print Rabbi, Jerusalem Alley Israeli Judaica Micha Bar-Am

By Micha Bar-Am

Located in Surfside, FL

Rare vintage signed and dated silver gelatin black & white unframed photograph. (printed circa 19730-1981) signed and numbered in ink on recto. Hand developed by or under the personal direction of Micha Bar Am at the studio of acclaimed printer Thomas Consilvio in Beverly Hills, California. In 1981, the negatives were retired and donated by Bar-Am to the permanent archives of the Tel-Aviv Museum, Israel. This one has the feel of a Roman Vishniac photo. Micha Bar-Am (Hebrew: מיכה בר-עם) (born 1930 in Berlin, Germany) is an Israeli journalistic photographer. His images cover every aspect of life in Israel in the past sixty years. Since 1968 he has been a correspondent with Magnum, the photographic cooperative. From 1968 to 1992, he was the New York Times photographic correspondent from Israel. He has published several books of photography, beginning in 1957. His work is held in numerous international museums and institutes throughout the world. Born in Berlin to a Jewish family, Bar-Am moved with his parents in 1936 to then British Mandate of Palestine. He attended local schools. He was drafted in 1948 and served during Israel's War of Independence, when he was part of the Palmach Unit. Afterward, he worked several jobs, including as a locksmith and a mounted guard, before becoming a photographer. In 1949 he co-founded the kibbutz Malkia in Galilee. Later he became a member of Kibbutz Gesher HaZiv. Photography career In the early 1940s, Bar-Am started taking pictures of life on a kibbutz; he used borrowed cameras until he bought a Leica. After his military service, he began photographing more seriously. After publishing his first book, Across Sinai (1957), Bar-Am gained work as a photographic reporter and in the editorial staff of the Israeli Army magazine, Ba-Mahaneh, from 1957 to 1967. In 1961 he covered the Adolf Eichmann trial. In 1967 he covered the Six-Day War, during which time he met Cornell Capa. Many of his war images brought him renown. Since 1968, he has been a correspondent for Magnum Photos. In 1974 he helped Capa found the International Center of Photography in New York City. In 1968, Bar-Am also became the photographic correspondent from Israel for the New York Times, a position he held until 1992. From 1977-92, he was head of the department of photography at the Tel Aviv Museum of Art. He says that he has adopted Robert Capa saying, "If your photographs aren't good enough, you weren't close enough," Awards 2000--Israel Prize for photography. 1993—Enrique Kavlin Prize, Israel Museum, Jerusalem, Israel 1985-86--Nieman Fellow, Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA 1985—IBM Fellowship, Aspen, Colorado, USA 1985—Golden Flamingo Award for Photographic Poster, Arles, France 1985--Fulbright Grant Books Southward: Micha Bar-Am, Photographs, Israel: The Negev Museum of Art, 2013 Insight: Micha Bar-Am's Israel, London: Koenig Books / Israel: Open Museums, 2011 Israel: A Photobiography, USA: Simon & Schuster, 1998 The Last War, Israel: Keter Publishers, 1996 Painting With Light: The Photographic Aspect in the Work of E.M. Lilian, Israel: Tel Aviv Museum of Art/Dvir Publishing, 1991 Jewish Sites in Lebanon, USA: Moreshet Eretz-Yisrael/Ariel, 1984 The Jordan, Israel: Masada Ltd., 1981 Portrait of Israel, USA: New York Times/American Heritage Press, 1970 Across Sinai, Israel: Hakibbutz Hameuchad, 1957 Collections Israel Museum, Jerusalem, Israel Tel Aviv Museum of Art, Tel Aviv, Israel Haifa Museum, Haifa, Israel The Museum of the Jewish People at Beit Hatfutsot, Tel Aviv, Israel The Museum of Photography at Tel Hai, Tel Hai Kibbutz, Israel International Center of Photography, New York, USA The Museum of Modern Art, New York, USA Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, USA International Museum of Photography at George Eastman House, Rochester, USA Skirball Museum, Los Angeles, USA Minneapolis Institute of Arts, Minneapolis, USA Henry Buhl Collection, New York, USA Ludwig Museum, Cologne, Germany Folkwang Museum, Essen, Germany Bibliothèque Nationale, Paris, France Musée d'Art et d'Histoire du Judaïsme, Paris, France Collection FNAC, Paris, France Fundacion “La Caixa”, Barcelona, Spain National Maritime Museum, London, UK Magnum Photos: Photographic Collection, Harry Ransom Center, University of Texas at Austin, USA This photo is signed. It is from the height of the war. Leonard Freed, Micha Bar Am, Henri Cartier-Bresson, David Rubinger...

Category

1970s Realist Figurative Photography

Materials

Silver Gelatin

Governing Couple
Governing Couple

Governing Couple

By Slim Aarons

Located in Los Angeles, CA

Nancy Reagan and her husband film star and Governor of California, Ronald Reagan (later the 40th President of the USA) in Acapulco, mexico. Complimentary dealer shipping to your fr...

Category

1970s Realist Figurative Photography

Materials

C Print

Mary Pickford Douglas Fairbanks at Walpi First Mesa Hopi Village 1920 Photograph
Mary Pickford Douglas Fairbanks at Walpi First Mesa Hopi Village 1920 Photograph

Mary Pickford Douglas Fairbanks at Walpi First Mesa Hopi Village 1920 Photograph

Located in Soquel, CA

Mary Pickford and Douglas Fairbanks at Walpi First Mesa Hopi Village 1920 Photograph Original Sepia toned Silver gelatin photographic print by Charles Roshe (British, 1885-1974). Provenance: Mary Pickford, Elizabeth (Bess) Huggins. Image 10.75"H x 13.75"W He was Mary Pickford's favorite cinematographer and a personal friend, shooting all of the films in which she starred from 1918 to 1927, before they had a falling out during production of Coquette (1929). He was the first cinematographer to receive an Academy Award, along with Karl Struss, for Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans (1927), and won again for The Yearling (1946), with Leonard Smith and Arthur Arling. He was also nominated four times. Walpi, pueblo (village), Navajo county, northeastern Arizona, U.S., on the edge of a high mesa in the Hopi Indian Reservation. It comprises a group of angular stone houses of two to three stories crowded on a narrow tip of the steep-walled mesa at an elevation of 6,225 feet (1,897 metres). The original pueblo (founded c. 1700) was on a lower part of the mesa, but following the Pueblo Rebellion, the inhabitants moved to the top as a defensive measure against Spanish retaliation. Walpi is known for an antelope ceremony and for snake dances, held during odd years in August and generally closed to non-Hopi spectators. Shitchumovi (Sichomivi) pueblo is adjacent and Hano is nearby. Pickford was the first Canadian to win an Oscar. She was also the second to win best actress and the first for a role in a film with sound. She was one of the founding members of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. In 1919 Pickford took the lead in organizing the United Artists Corporation with Griffith, Charlie Chaplin, and Douglas Fairbanks. In 1920, after the dissolution of her first marriage (1911–19) to actor Owen Moore, she married Fairbanks (divorced 1936). Pickford’s popularity continued unabated in Pollyanna (1920), Little Lord...

Category

1920s Realist Figurative Photography

Materials

Photographic Paper, Silver Gelatin

Realist figurative photography for sale on 1stDibs.

Find a wide variety of authentic Realist figurative photography available for sale on 1stDibs. Works in this style were very popular during the 21st Century and Contemporary, but contemporary artists have continued to produce works inspired by this movement. If you’re looking to add figurative photography created in this style to introduce contrast in an otherwise neutral space in your home, the works available on 1stDibs include elements of blue, purple, red, pink and other colors. Many Pop art paintings were created by popular artists on 1stDibs, including Slim Aarons, Ron Tarver, Graham Nash, and Milton Rogovin. Frequently made by artists working with Digital Print, and Lambda Print and other materials, all of these pieces for sale are unique and have attracted attention over the years. Not every interior allows for large Realist figurative photography, so small editions measuring 8 inches across are also available. Prices for figurative photography made by famous or emerging artists can differ depending on medium, time period and other attributes. On 1stDibs, the price for these items starts at $105 and tops out at $75,000, while the average work sells for $3,000.