
Helen Levitt
Thames & Hudson Ltd (Publisher)
Published on 16. October 2025
Book
Hardback
304 pages
978-0-500-03097-4 (ISBN)
Description
Published to accompany a major touring exhibition, this is the most comprehensive survey to date of the groundbreaking American photographer Helen Levitt.
Over six decades, Helen Levitt (1913-2009) explored the streets of her native New York with a handheld camera. Influenced by Henri Cartier-Bresson, she found inspiration in the theatre and spontaneity of the street, capturing everyday moments in urban life and forging a distinct visual language from her private observations. Exuding a keen warmth and sensitivity for human gesture and movement, her photographs capture, in James Agee's words, the 'pure spontaneity of true folk art'.
Accompanying a major touring exhibition of Levitt's work, the first of its kind to draw from her complete archive, this ambitious publication showcases her entire output. It not only includes her best-known photographs, but also features rarely seen early works from her first year using a Leica and all fifty works from the original edit of her classic 1965 photobook A Way of Seeing, with record prints preserved by Levitt herself.
Essays by a range of scholars and specialists hone in on key thematic, technical and biographical aspects of Levitt's life and work, including an examination of the photos she took during her trip to Mexico in 1941, her innovative use of colour in the 1950s and her late work from the 1980s, providing an authoritative insight into one of the most influential photographers of the 20th century.
Over six decades, Helen Levitt (1913-2009) explored the streets of her native New York with a handheld camera. Influenced by Henri Cartier-Bresson, she found inspiration in the theatre and spontaneity of the street, capturing everyday moments in urban life and forging a distinct visual language from her private observations. Exuding a keen warmth and sensitivity for human gesture and movement, her photographs capture, in James Agee's words, the 'pure spontaneity of true folk art'.
Accompanying a major touring exhibition of Levitt's work, the first of its kind to draw from her complete archive, this ambitious publication showcases her entire output. It not only includes her best-known photographs, but also features rarely seen early works from her first year using a Leica and all fifty works from the original edit of her classic 1965 photobook A Way of Seeing, with record prints preserved by Levitt herself.
Essays by a range of scholars and specialists hone in on key thematic, technical and biographical aspects of Levitt's life and work, including an examination of the photos she took during her trip to Mexico in 1941, her innovative use of colour in the 1950s and her late work from the 1980s, providing an authoritative insight into one of the most influential photographers of the 20th century.
Reviews / Votes
'This elegant, authoritative book gathers a lifetime of those encounters and makes you grateful that she carried a camera at all' - Amateur PhotographerMore details
Language
English
Place of publication
London
United Kingdom
Illustrations
279 Illustrations, black and white; 77 Illustrations, color
Dimensions
Height: 285 mm
Width: 246 mm
Thickness: 30 mm
Weight
1708 gr
ISBN-13
978-0-500-03097-4 (9780500030974)
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Schweitzer Classification
Persons
Joshua Chuang is director of photography at Gagosian.