RIP Fred Herzog

Another great photographer dies. 'Modern Colour' is a fantastic and full revelation of his work.

Here's what I wrote for our photographic group:

More to my taste overall, and a very impressive German production, is Fred Herzog, Modern Colour. Although it is advertised as a paperback, it is in fact a hardback. The printing is first class. Herzog shot with Kodachrome for his street photographs, – something more than ‘street’ and way beyond documentary. They are gently observed scenes and details of Vancouver, his adopted home, and elsewhere. The colour is not merely incidental. They are mostly full of light and space, carefully framed but some are a jumble of street colours. The more intense observations include a solitary anonymous arm reaching across the window between the gap in the curtains and the interiors of shops through their windows, cars stranded in back lanes or incongruously perfect in a rundown neighborhood driveway.

The accompanying essays are interesting. He liked to shoot from the hip to avoid the camera up to his eye and altering the behaviour of his subjects. How he kept the camera level for those shots on slide film is beyond me. One reason he used Kodachrome was his busy day job. He shoots a roll of film, puts it in its yellow envelope, into the post box, and a week later he has a box of 36 slides. No darkroom, chemicals and trays and dust and sleepless nights. Of course that consigned them to relative obscurity until they could be properly scanned in the modern era and made more accessible.
 
Herzog pictures were good, but sadly in a few interviews,
another darker side was revealed and paraded , only the jackboots left out..
He was a teacher and one worries what he taught..
Many of you will be angered with me, so be it!
Interview "Globe and Mail" Toronto Canada...
 
He is great example to new Canadian.
Came for better life, abolished his old world wrong assumptions by integrating to society.
Worked hard; including physically. Enjoyed his life after work while not been corporate slave. Been consistent on his hobby. Not been snobby after recognition.
And used low cost cameras!
 
Herzog pictures were good, but sadly in a few interviews,
another darker side was revealed and paraded , only the jackboots left out..
He was a teacher and one worries what he taught..
Many of you will be angered with me, so be it!
Interview "Globe and Mail" Toronto Canada...
Click to expand...
Not angered but surprised...when you make vague references to wrong doing, you should, at least provide a link to the interview in question.
 
Out to Lunch said:
Not angered but surprised...when you make vague references to wrong doing, you should, at least provide a link to the interview in question.
Click to expand...

Herzog was Holocaust denier for sometime.

https://www.google.ca/amp/s/www.the...d-herzog-the-holocaust-and-me/article4104746/

But at his older age he was able to understand it.

As for LP remarks, Holocaust denierizm is not uncommon in Canada.
Anti Jewish crime is on the rise in Canada /“surprise, surprise”/.
Where are professors in Canada who goes on Holocaust denier conferences.
And here is anti Israel call from so called union leaders.

Lets leave Herzog out of this. He did not possessed swastika and nazies standards like some do in rural Ontario at their mansions.
 
xavyr said:
https://www.theglobeandmail.com/arts/the-collision-fred-herzog-the-holocaust-and-me/article4104746/

Yeah, surprised.
Click to expand...

The Globe piece is discussed in this much fuller article in Canadian Art:
https://bit.ly/2lOLS10

As an aside, I work with people for whom English is a second language, and coincidentally a few weeks after the Globe article was talking to a client who used “so-called” to mean “commonly known as.” The sad thing is that the Globe piece caused him to lose the Scotiabank Contact photography prize that year, and he was never nominated again.

Even living in Canada, I did not know of Fred Herzog until about 10 years ago. Canadian photo magazines seemed to be fixated on nature photography, and that such a great street photographer and pioneer in colour street photography was among us, was not widely known.
 
I've met and conversed with Fred a couple of times, he was friends with Tom. I understand he was removed from the cultural process that Germany went through in the second half of the 20th century, and he should have informed himself better. Nevertheless, he struck me as a kind and thoughtful person who didn't wish any harm upon his fellow human beings.

We are lucky to have shared time on this planet with photographers like him, Robert Frank, and so many others.

here's pictures:



 
I have a lot of photographs I still want to make. I hope I live as long as some of these photo-luminaries we have lost in the past few days.

Life behind the camera is life well lived.
 
Thank you for sharing this. I didn't know much at all about Fred Herzog, and had only seen a few of his photographs. This thread has revealed much more to me about the man and his work. His story is tragic and difficult and complicated, as is history, and for all this story reveals, the education is deeply worthwhile. His photographs are a beautiful look at the time and place he lived, and a wonderful example of fine street photography. There's much to learn here, from the work and the man, and for that I am grateful.
 
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