Walter Pfeiffer
Encyclopedia
Life and career
Walter Pfeiffer was born in Zurich, in 1946 and has been producing since the early 1970s. His portraits of friends, lovers and the youth surrounding him in cities such as ZurichZürich
Zurich is the largest city in Switzerland and the capital of the canton of Zurich. It is located in central Switzerland at the northwestern tip of Lake Zurich...
, Paris
Paris
Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...
and New York
New York
New York is a state in the Northeastern region of the United States. It is the nation's third most populous state. New York is bordered by New Jersey and Pennsylvania to the south, and by Connecticut, Massachusetts and Vermont to the east...
would link him to other photographers of that decade, such as Nan Goldin
Nan Goldin
Nancy "Nan" Goldin is an American photographer.-Life and work:Goldin was born in Washington, D.C., and grew up in the Boston, Massachusetts suburb of Lexington, to middle class Jewish parents whose ideas, moderately liberal and progressive, were put to the test when on April 12, 1965 their eldest...
and Nobuyoshi Araki
Nobuyoshi Araki
is a Japanese photographer and contemporary artist. He is also known by the nickname .-Life and career:Araki was born in Tokyo, studied photography during his college years and then went to work at the advertising agency Dentsu, where he met his future wife, the essayist Yōko Araki...
. His first publication came in the end of the 1970s, with the volume Walter Pfeiffer: 1970-1980 (Elke Betzel, 1980). The next two decades were spent in relative obscurity, while the photographer kept on producing his photography and a few videos, while at the same time returning to painting. The breakthrough and rediscovery of his work would have to wait until the beginning of the century, when Welcome Aboard, Photographs 1980-2000 (Edition Patrick Frey/Scab, 2001) was published. His work was then linked to the revival of realistic photography
Photography
Photography is the art, science and practice of creating durable images by recording light or other electromagnetic radiation, either electronically by means of an image sensor or chemically by means of a light-sensitive material such as photographic film...
in the 1990s and early 2000s, with artists such as Wolfgang Tillmans
Wolfgang Tillmans
Wolfgang Tillmans is a German Fine-art photographer and artist. His comprehensive and diverse body of work is distinguished by observation of his surroundings and an ongoing investigation of the photographic medium’s foundations. In 2000, Tillmans was the first photographer and also the first...
, Ryan McGinley
Ryan McGinley
Ryan McGinley is an American photographer living in New York City who began making photographs in 1998. In 2003, at the age of 25, McGinley was one of the youngest artist to have a solo show at the Whitney Museum of American Art. He was also named Photographer of the Year in 2003 by American Photo...
, Slava Mogutin
Slava Mogutin
Slava Mogutin is a New York-based Russian artist and author, who works across different media, including photography, video, text, installation, sculpture and painting.-Life and work:...
, Heinz Peter Knes
Heinz Peter Knes
Heinz Peter Knes works with photography, he is born in 1969 in Gemünden am Main, Germany.Heinz Peter Knes studied photography on Fachhochschule Dortmund, from 1993-1999. Since 2001 Knes has lived in Berlin...
and Jack Pierson
Jack Pierson
Jack Pierson is a photographer and an artist. He studied at the Massachusetts College of Art in Boston. Pierson has made a name for himself with a body of work that includes photographs, collages, word sculptures, installations, drawings and artists books...
. His influence on the work of photographers like Juergen Teller
Juergen Teller
Juergen Teller is an artist and fashion photographer.-Life and career:Teller studied at the Bayerische Staatslehranstalt für Photographie in Munich, Germany...
has been noted. Since then, Walter Pfeiffer has collaborated with international magazines as diverse in style and audience as i-D
I-D
i-D is a British magazine dedicated to fashion, music, art and youth culture. i-D was founded by designer and former Vogue art director Terry Jones in 1980. The first issue was published in the form of a hand-stapled fanzine with text produced on a typewriter...
, Butt
Butt
Butt may refer to:* Butt , a unit of wine* Butt , a target for practicing archery* Butt , a joint between planks of wood on a ship* Butt * Bhat , Kashmiri surname sometimes spelled "Butt"* Butt...
and Vogue
Vogue (magazine)
Vogue is a fashion and lifestyle magazine that is published monthly in 18 national and one regional edition by Condé Nast.-History:In 1892 Arthur Turnure founded Vogue as a weekly publication in the United States. When he died in 1909, Condé Montrose Nast picked up the magazine and slowly began...
.
Publications
His first book of photographs, Walter Pfeiffer: 1970-1980, was published in 1980, followed a few years later by The eyes, the thoughts, ceaselessly wandering (Nachbar der Welt, 1986), but raised little attention. His work would only garner an international audience after the publication of Welcome Aboard, Photographs 1980-2000, in 2001. Since then, three new books have followed, released by international publishing houses such as Hatje Cantz and Steidl, including Night and Day (Hatje Cantz, 2007), Walter Pfeiffer: In Love with Beauty (Steidl, 2009) and Cherchez la femme!, also in 2009.Exhibitions
Exhibitions of Walter Pfeiffer's photography have multiplied considerably in the past decade, due in part to his collaborations with magazines such as i-DI-D
i-D is a British magazine dedicated to fashion, music, art and youth culture. i-D was founded by designer and former Vogue art director Terry Jones in 1980. The first issue was published in the form of a hand-stapled fanzine with text produced on a typewriter...
and Vogue
Vogue (magazine)
Vogue is a fashion and lifestyle magazine that is published monthly in 18 national and one regional edition by Condé Nast.-History:In 1892 Arthur Turnure founded Vogue as a weekly publication in the United States. When he died in 1909, Condé Montrose Nast picked up the magazine and slowly began...
, but also the publications of his books by Hatje Cantz and other international publishers. In the past few years, his most important shows were in New York
New York
New York is a state in the Northeastern region of the United States. It is the nation's third most populous state. New York is bordered by New Jersey and Pennsylvania to the south, and by Connecticut, Massachusetts and Vermont to the east...
and Paris
Paris
Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...
, in galleries such as Galerie Baumet Sultana (Paris), Team Gallery and Anna Kustera (New York).
Models
Walter Pfeiffer hast stated in interviews that he prefers to work with non-professionals. His casting is usually done by himself, friends and a few assistants, often approaching subjects in the street. However, in the past few years, due to his work in the fashion industry, Pfeiffer has also photographed professional models such as Magdalena FrackowiakMagdalena Frackowiak
Magdalena Frackowiak is a Polish fashion model who began appearing on international runways in 2006....
, Eva Herzigová
Eva Herzigová
Eva Herzigová is a Czech model and actress.-Early life and career:Herzigová was born in Litvínov, Czechoslovakia . She began her modeling career after winning a modeling beauty contest in Prague in 1989, at the age of sixteen. After arriving in Paris, her popularity increased...
, Francisco Lachowski and Lorcan Leather-barrow.
Books
- Walter Pfeiffer: 1970-1980 (Elke Betzel, 1980).
- The eyes, the thoughts, ceaselessly wandering (Nachbar der Welt, 1986).
- Welcome Aboard, Photographs 1980-2000 (Edition Patrick Frey/Scab, 2001).
- Night and Day (Hatje Cantz, 2007).
- Walter Pfeiffer: In Love with Beauty (Steidl, 2009).
- Cherchez la femme! (2009).