MAGNUM IN THE GARDEN

MAGNUM GARDEN VIEWS

Photographers and gardens were meant for each other in many ways. Gardens are designed and cultivated for many reasons, but their visual impact is practically universally considered. And while gardens make it easy for amateurs to look good, gardens gain serious magic through the lenses of master photographers.

The Magnum Photos agency represents some of the world’s most renowned photographers, with an extraordinary range of individual styles. Magnum was founded in 1947, by Henri Cartier-Bresson, Robert Capa, George Rodger, and David Seymour. Membership must be earned through peer review and considered the finest accolade of a photographer’s career.

Inspired by Aperture’s new book The Photographer in the Garden, Magnum gathered a collection of photos from their archive that show what some of the top photographers can do with all kinds of gardens.

Some Magnum photographers, such as Martin Parr, are interested in the garden as social landscape. Garden style reflects aesthetics, skill, passion and, on some level, even politics.

As the archival collection spans history, we see, de facto, a history of gardens. We see the changing relationship between humans and gardens.

We see see gardens that range from simple and sweet, to gardens the are simply wild frolics to gardens that are intricately designed and meticulously groomed, with nary a petal out of place.

Magnum photographer Chris Steele-Perkins finds softness in the rough edges of English gardens and closeups of individual flowers that have begun to escape cultural control.

Magnum Photographer Dennis Stock, brings out the soft romance of flowers. His photos of Monet’s garden at Giverny are quite painterly. His close-up flower studies are reminiscent of O’Keefe.

In a New York Times interview, he says, “The arts interact, and the photographer has to be constantly awakened to ideas, to graphics, tones, color relationships, to pursue color from a painter’s point of view. I am flattered when people say, ‘It’s like a painting'.”

See more Magnum Photos here. You may be inspired to collect. And perhaps you are inspired to see what you can do with a garden and camera.

Read more about In the Garden in Photographers in Gardens: Part 1 and Photographer In Garden: Part II.

And check out more beautiful things happening now in BN Mind/Body, Soul/Impact, Nature/Science, Food/Drink, Arts/Design, and Place/Time, Daily Fix posts.

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IMAGE CREDITS:

1. Image: by Dennis Stock. “The gardens of Claude Monet. Giverny. Normandy. France.” Courtesy of Magnum Photos.
2. Image: by Martin Parr. “Loders Street Fair, England.” Courtesy of Magnum Photos.
3. Image: by Martin Parr. “Flowers near a bowling green. Bristol, England.” Courtesy of Magnum Photos.
4. Image: by Chris Steele-Perkins. “A Park garden, Leamington Spa.” England. Courtesy of Magnum Photos.
5. Image: by Dennis Stock. “Tulip” Series. Courtesy of Magnum Photos.
6. Image: by Dennis Stock. “The gardens of Claude Monet. Giverny. Normandy. France.” Courtesy of Magnum Photos.
7. Image: by Chris Steele-Perkins. “Flowers from the garden.” East Dulwich. London, England. Courtesy of Magnum Photos.
8. Image: by Martin Parr. “A mock Tudor house and garden. Dorchester. Weymouth, England.” Courtesy of Magnum Photos.
9. Image: by Martin Parr. “Dorset, West Bay. England.” Courtesy of Magnum Photos.
10. Image: by Chris Steele-Perkins. “Garden and landscape, Cumbria. England.” “The Pleasure Principle.” Courtesy of Magnum Photos.