In 1971, Jerry L. Thompson enrolled at the Yale School of Art, driven by a desire to further his photographic practice and study with the lauded photographer Walker Evans. The pair proceeded to develop a close professional relationship and friendship, with Thompson becoming Evans’s assistant for a number of years. Accompanying Evans on shooting excursions, printing in the darkroom, mounting prints, and handling the extensive archive, Thompson was privy to not only the artist’s process and theory of the medium but also his personality and eccentricities.
Following Evans’s passing in 1975, Thompson wrote an account of the last four years of the artist’s life, providing an intimate and empathetic glimpse into one of the most influential American photographers of the 20th century.
Thompson made this print in Evans’s darkroom in Old Lyme, Connecticut, in 1972. Evans had borrowed this negative, and a few others, back from the Library of Congress to have some prints made for his own use. As compensation, Evans gave Thompson this print in exchange for his printing services. The prints on offer in lots 24 and 25 are directly from Walker Evans to Jerry Thompson. This photograph was shown in Walker Evans Anonymous at Les Recontres de la Photographie in Arles in 2015, an exhibition which traveled to two other
Provenance
Gift of the photographer to Jerry L. Thompson, 1972
Exhibited
Walker Evans Anonymous, Les Recontres de la Photographie, Arles, 2015; and traveling to Fondation A, Brussels, 2016; Fondazione Palazzo Magnani, Reggio Emilia, 2016
Literature
Evans, American Photographs, Part One, pl. 2
Walker Evans: Photographs for the Farm Security Administration 1935-1938, pl. 229
Walker Evans: First and Last, p. 127
Walker Evans at Work, cover and p. 239
Keller, Walker Evans: The Getty Museum Collection, p. 161, no. 517
Szarkowski, Looking at Photographs, p, 117
24
Penny Picture Display, Savannah
1936
Gelatin silver print, printed 1972 by Jerry L. Thompson.
10 x 8 in. (25.4 x 20.3 cm)
Signed, dated, and annotated by Jerry L. Thompson in pencil on the verso.
Estimate
$5,000 - 7,000
Sarah Krueger
Head of Department, Photographs
skrueger@phillips.com
Vanessa Hallett
Worldwide Head of Photographs and Chairwoman, Americas
vhallett@phillips.com
Photographs
New York Auction 11 October 2023
237
This lot is no longer available.
246
This lot is no longer available.
