© Richard Avedon

"When you pose for a photograph, it's behind a smile that isn't yours. You are angry and hungry and alive. What I value in you is that intensity. I want to make portraits as intense as people." - Richard Avedon, from a 1970 letter to his father Jacob Israel Avedon

At the recent post exploring the elements of a great portrait, Bruce Haley highlighted the portraits that Richard Avedon took from his father, Jacob Israel Avedon, before he passed away in 1973 after fighting cancer for few years. I thought it may be worthwhile to share them with you, in case you have not see them before. You will find the series over at Avedon's site, under portraits, portfolio "Jacob Israel Avedon".

Personally, I was intensely moved when I saw these images. It is not only about the keen ability of Avedon to reveal emotions but the fact that these images provided a language to communicate between the artist and his father in the last years before cancer took his live. Sometimes you see images that grab you from the soul, and these ones got me.

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Following a period of estrangement from his father Jacob Israel Avedon, Richard Avedon sought a way to reconnect with him. Having already established a reputation for his work as a portrait photographer, Avedon (1923-2004), asked his father if he would agree to be photographed. The elder Avedon agreed and his son took pictures of him annually beginning in 1969 and documented his struggle with cancer until his death in 1973.

The seven portraits included in the exhibition are unflinchingly candid and poignantly convey Jacob Avedon's struggle to survive with dignity until life's end.

[PACE/MACGILL Gallery, New York City, in exhibition few days more until February 16th]

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