For Bill Cunningham (1929 – 2016) and Toyo Tsuchiya (1948 – 2017) the term “street photography” is not limited to pictures taken on the street but also includes photographs of events and performances. Both photographers were part of a trend among artists in the 1980s to document and archive the creative worlds that they belonged in and were passionate about.
In many ways Cunningham and Tsuchiya were exact opposites. Cunningham worked for publications documenting and promoting the rarified world of high fashion; Tsuchiya, on the other hand, recorded one of the grittiest parts of the downtown art world, preserving for posterity the ephemeral creations of his artist friends connected to the so-called Rivington School.
Bill Cunningham and Details Magazine, 1982 – 1990
Bill Cunningham, Pat Cleveland in Patrick Kelly’s homage to Josephine Baker. Advertising Counter Card for Details Magazine, September 1986. Size: 11.5 x 15.5 Inches — Available
Bill Cunningham is most famous for his two long-running New York Times photographic columns showing fashion on the streets and high society events. Earlier in the 1980s, he perfected his skills covering the fashion world for Details Magazine. His exhaustive coverage of the fall and spring fashion shows in New York, Paris and London defined Details with photo spreads that often exceeded 100 pages.
Gallery 98 covered this aspect of his work in our online exhibition Bill Cunningham & Details Magazine, 1982-90. In Details, Cunningham left a remarkable fashion archive covering all the major designers as well as personal favorites like Patrick Kelly (1954-90), a successful African American designer based in Paris known for creating clothing lines full of wit and humor. Almost all of Cunningham’s fashion spreads in Details can be seen in our special online exhibition.
Bill Cunningham, The Mad Hatter, Patrick Kelly, Follies to Futurism, Details Magazine, September 1987. Size: 9 x 11.5 Inches — Full Magazine Available
Bill Cunningham, Image From Patrick Kelly’s 1988 Fall Line, Cover Designed and Painted by Michael McDonnell, Details Magazine, September 1988. Size: 8.5 x 11 Inches — Full Magazine Available
Toyo Tsuchiya and The Rivington School Sculpture Garden, 1985 – 1987
Toyo Tsuchiya in Collaboration with Gallery 98, Cover of Rivington School Sculpture Garden Portfolio, 2017, Containing Twelve Annotated Digital Prints in a Matboard and Foamcore Portfolio. Size: 23 ¾” x 10 ¾” x ¾” Inches — Portfolio Available
Soon after arriving in New York from Japan in 1980, Toyo Tsuchiya found his peer group in the freewheeling Lower East Side art scene centered around the social club No Se No and the wild anarchistic sculpture garden that artists created in a nearby vacant lot. For a time Toyo ran No Se No designing its posters and photographing the events and activities of his Rivington School friends.
In 2017, Gallery 98 worked with Tsuchiya to create a special portfolio featuring his photographs of the Rivington Sculpture Garden for our online exhibition Linus Coraggio, Toyo Tsuchiya, and the Rivington School, 1983- 95. The 13 annotated digital prints including a panorama on the portfolio cover trace the short history of one of the Lower East Side’s most memorable landmarks. Sadly, it is among the last projects undertaken by Tsuchiya who died unexpectedly just as the portfolio was being completed.
Toyo Tsuchiya, Rivington School Night Event— DeMoMo’s Scrap Metal Music, 1986, An Annotated Photograph From the Portfolio “Rivington School Sculpture Garden”, 2017 — Portfolio Available
Toyo Tsuchiya, Tovey Halleck With His 24ft Iron Beam Arch, 1985, From the Portfolio “Rivington School Sculpture Garden”, 2017 — Portfolio Available
Toyo Tsuchiya, Rivington Artists Welding Work With Ray Kelly, David Mora, Tovey Halleck, 1986, From the Portfolio “Rivington School Sculpture Garden”, 2017 — Portfolio Available
