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  1/13
  Tilly Losch, 1928
  (Vintage gelatin-silver print)
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  2/13
  Bell Ringers at St Olave’s Church, Hart Street, London, 1935
  (Vintage gelatin-silver print)
• 
  3/13
  Making Waxworks at Madame Tussaud’s, London, 1935
  (Modern gelatin-silver print)
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  4/13
  Anna May Wong, 1926
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  5/13
  Ezra Pound, 1918
  (Vintage gelatin-silver print)
• 
  6/13
  London Type, “Highly Respectable”, c.1912
  (Vintage gelatin-silver print)
• 
  7/13
  Roedean School, Percussion Band, Brighton, Sussex, 1935
  (Modern gelatin-silver print)
• 
  8/13
  Physical Education, Kings School, Canterbury, Kent, c.1939
  (Vintage gelatin-silver print)
• 
  9/13
  Passengers on a bus, London, “The Long Trail from City to Suburbia,” 1945
  (Vintage gelatin-silver print)
• 
  10/13
  New York Type, 1921
  (Vintage gelatin-silver print)
• 
  11/13
  “Flora,” Flower lady, Piccadilly Circus, London Type, 1921
  (Vintage gelatin-silver print)
• 
  12/13
  The “Pearlies,” Master Dennis Simmons, London, 1922
  (Vintage gelatin-silver print)
• 
  13/13
  A Big Fish Story, West Looe, Cornwall, 1932
  (Vintage gelatin-silver print)

Curated by Phillip Prodger

In the 1920s and 30s Emil Otto Hoppé (British, German born, 1878–1972) was one of the most sought-after photographers in the world. He spent the first decade of his long photographic career pioneering the art of celebrity portraiture. Breaking with the formal stiffness of the Victorian studio, Hoppé’s early twentieth century portraits depicted leading celebrities including writers such as George Bernard Shaw, H.G. Wells, T.S. Eliot, and Ezra Pound, legendary dancers such as Vaslav Nijinsky and Margot Fonteyn, and royals of the Edwardian era in shocking new way: they looked natural.

“. . . the triumph of Hoppé’s talent was that he persuades us
of something of the complexities of his sitter’s inner life and the
intricacies of their biographies . . .”
— Lady Marina Vaizey, London, 2012

Hoppé’s studio in South Kensington was a magnet for the rich and famous, and for years he actively led the global art scene an on both sides of the Atlantic while also photographing around the globe, making over thirty photographically-illustrated books and establishing himself as a pioneering figure in photographic art and photojournalism, set apart from his peers by his international reputation.

Increasingly in the 1930s Hoppé left the studio to make photographs of British street life. These pictures, sometimes funny and often poignant, explored ideas about class and typology that paralleled the writings of his friend, the playwright George Bernard Shaw. Using a hidden camera, Hoppé photographed people at the other end of the social spectrum: sleeping rough, living in hostels, and barely getting by. He also immersed himself in London’s growing immigrant communities. As waves of immigration from Europe, Asia, and Africa turned Britain into a multicultural nation, Hoppé was making its collective portrait. His photographs show a nation with one foot planted firmly in the past, and another reaching toward the future.

Society, Studio and Street brings two aspects of Hoppé’s work together for the first time, and marks the rediscovery of Hoppé as a pivotal figure in Edwardian art and photo-modernism.

For more information and images visit the E.O. Hoppé Estate Collection website.

View Exhibition Prospectus (PDF)

Number of Works: 142 photographs, 10 cased objects (vintage magazine articles, books, cartoons)
Frame Sizes: 14 x 11 inches (35 x 28 cm) to 20 x 16 inches (50 x 40 cm)
Space Requirements: 400 linear feet (120 linear meters)
Tour Dates: Summer 2011 through 2014
Participation Fee: Contact CATE for information
Support Materials:
Exhibition catalogue (National Portrait Gallery, 2011)
Exhibition catalogue (spanish translation) (MAPFRE, 2011)

REVIEWS AND NEWS

Quesabesde, Eduardo Parra, March 21, 2012
La Nueva España, Joaquín Rábago, March 20, 2012
El Mundo, Elena Vozmediano, March 16, 2012
Paper Blog, Carol, March 16, 2012
Ambos Mundos, Alejandro Sanz Peinado, March 14, 2012
El Mundo, Alfredo Merino, March 9, 2012
Diario ABC, Antonio Astorga, March 7, 2012
Arte en la Red, March 7, 2012
RITMOS XXI, March 7, 2012
El Correo Gallego, March 6, 2012
El País, Ángeles García, March 6, 2012
ARN Digital, Luis Cáceres, March 6, 2012
La Lettre de la Phorographie, Bernard Perrine, March 2012
Burlington Magazine, Lady Marina Vaizey, April 27, 2011
Bloomberg Online, Martin Gayford, April 17, 2011
The Spectator, Nicola McCartney, March 10, 2011
Royal Photographic Society Journal (book essay excerpt), March 2011
Financial Times, Francis Hodgson, February 25, 2011
Arts Desk, Judith Flanders, February 23, 2011
History Today, Sheila Corr, February 18, 2011
Time Out London, Nina Kaplan, February 17, 2011
Artdaily, February 17, 2011
Culture 24, Laura Burgess, February 17, 2011
Who's Jack, February 17, 2011
L'ItaloEuropeo, David Franchi, February 16, 2011
Small Aperture, Daniela Bowker, February 16, 2011
AnOther Mag, Lucia Davies, February 16, 2011
BBC Radio 4, John Wilson, February 16, 2011
BBC Radio 3, Anne McElvoy, February 15, 2011
The Telegraph, Lucy Davies, February 15, 2011
The Observer, Laura Cumming, February 13, 2011
The Guardian, Maev Kennedy, October 07, 2010
The Telegraph, October 07, 2010
The Independent, Robert Dex, October 07, 2010
Wales Online, Daniel Fisher, October 08, 2010

Exhibition websites

National Portrait Gallery, London
Fundación MAPFRE, Madrid
Monash Gallery of Art, Melbourne