Paving the way

27th January tour hosted by ToFF

Tom of Finland Foundation members were given a guided tour with Paul Martineau, Curator of Photographs at the J. Paul Getty Museum who along with James A. Ganz, Mazie M. Harris have plumb Tress’s work and archives, studying ephemera, personal correspondence, unpublished notes, diaries, contact sheets, and more to uncover how he went from earning his living as a social documentarian in Appalachia to producing surreal work of “imaginative fiction.”

This is the first exhibition to chronicle the early career of Arthur Tress, one of the most innovative American photographers of the postwar era. During his first decade as an emergent professional in the New York photography world (1968–78), his artistic practice evolved from the social documentary tradition to a bold new approach drawing inspiration from the inner worlds of fantasies, daydreams, and nightmares and established him as one of the foremost proponents of magical realism at a time when few others were doing staged photography.

ARTHUR TRESS: Rambles, Dreams, and Shadows
The J. Paul Getty Museum – Getty Center
31st October 2023 – 18th February 2024

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Lifetime Achievement Award – Arthur Tress

As a Gay man Arthur Tress used this skill and focused it on Gay desire and appreciation for men. Tress captured with his shutter dicks and desire and the decadence of the Gay male body. His photography paved the way for homoerotic photographers. His first one-man show was at the Robert Samuel gallery in the West Village that also exhibited his peers Robert Mapplethorpe and Peter Hujar.

We, at Tom of Finland Foundation, honor his contribution, artistic vision, and unabashed photographing of Gay desire.

Published: 27th February 2024

Categorised in: Events