Ernst Haas - Photographs New York Thursday, October 4, 2018 | Phillips

Photographs

New York Auction 4 October 2018

  • Provenance

    The Private Collection of Victoria Haas, New York, the artist’s daughter

  • Catalogue Essay

    "I want to be remembered much more for a total vision than for a few perfect single pictures." Ernst Haas

    Displaced Persons was taken in 1951 by Ernst Haas while on assignment for This Week, a magazine produced on Sundays and distributed with the New York Herald Tribune. Haas, an Austrian native, had been living and working in America since 1950, after Robert Capa appointed him Magnum Photo agency’s U.S. Vice President. It was Haas’ work back in Vienna which had caught Capa’s attention. In 1947, Haas debuted his work in an exhibition at the Vienna American Red Cross. Within the same year, Haas produced his first acclaimed photo essay Homecoming, published in Heute and Life magazines. The photo essay poignantly documented the bittersweet experience of prisoners of war returning home. Homecoming ultimately earned Haas an invitation to join Capa and Magnum eventually leading him to the United States.

    The early print on offer is quintessential of Haas’ earlier works and subjects close to his own experiences: a still moment of immigrants as they entered Ellis Island. Many of the people on the boats coming over at this time were largely displaced people from World War II. His acute photojournalistic sensibilities are ever present in this intimate composition of the bustling entrance to the United States.

131

Ernst Haas

Displaced Persons

1951
Gelatin silver print.
13 1/8 x 10 1/2 in. (33.3 x 26.7 cm)
Signed, titled by Alexander Haas, the artist's son, in pencil, Magnum credit, estate and estate copyright credit stamps on the verso.

Estimate
$12,000 - 18,000 

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Photographs

New York Auction 4 October 2018