By Paul Goldfinger, MD. Editor Blogfinger.net. Ocean Grove, NJ. USA. 12/24/23
This is one of my favorite photographs, and Diana Krall’s “White Christmas” is also very special. And so is the Christmas season where sleigh bells ring—are you listening?
Christmas music can be monotonous after awhile in December, but so much great music is about Christmas, so I like to post it out of season to show its uniqueness. It’s like the jewelry store principle: just take one diamond out at a time and show it by itself on black velvet in a light that makes it glow —–
“The White Night” Central Park, Christmas Eve, 1932. By Adolph Fassbender Re-posted from Blogfinger. 2014.
This photograph is from the January 27, 1997 issue of the New Yorker magazine. It was part of a photography exhibit review featuring the work of Adolph Fassbender (1884-1980).
He was an artist who followed the romantic painterly Pictorialist style of photography long after it fell into disfavor around 1915. The quote below is from the New Yorker piece about this image. The title of the article was “Slow Dazzle.”
” ‘The White Night,” made on Christmas Eve, 1932, in Central Park, during a late-afternoon blizzard, is one of the highlights of the Fassbender show opening this week at Gallery 292, in SoHo.
“The buildings on the Plaza were invisible but for a faint glow; the artist got off just one three-and-a-half-minute exposure before his shutter froze. Out of raging wind and snow he coaxed this woolly, lamplit nocturne — a tribute not to speed but to contentment and rest.
“Photograph shows a path in Central Park covered with snow, bordered by bare black branches, and buildings in the distance with lighted windows seen through mist.”
–reprinted from Blogfinger. By Paul Goldfinger, Editor.
DIANA KRALL
Haunting, glorious. A time when manhattan was a little more regal, strange, and full of curiosity, independence and beauty.
Bummer ! Oh well . In similar vein there is currently Clarence White show in Princeton .
Frank This is a re-post from 2014; that gallery show was back then.
A beautiful emotive photo . One of my favorites . Thanks for letting us know about show opening this week in NYC . Will make sure to catch it.
Reblogged this on shensea.
Paul-thank you for posting the wonderful photo by Adolph Fassbender. It has such painterly qualities that are so difficult to achieve. It’s so neat as when I was first chairman of the Photography I Sussex County exhibit at the Sussex County Farm & Horse Show we added an “Adolph Fassbender Memorial Award” to be awarded to the 1st place in the Advanced Amateur Division.
The gentleman who had been chairman before me knew Mr. Fassbender’s widow who at that time lived in Sparta, NJ and she gave us permission to use his name. The award is still being give and I was so pleased to have started it. Thank you again for sharing some of his remarkable work.