MA-g
The Museum of Avant-garde

Edmund Kesting

Germany (1892—1970)
Trained at the Dresden Academy of Fine Arts just after WWI, Kesting started his career as a Professor at the private school Der Weg, first in Dresden and later in Berlin. While he was exploring his own photographic style, creating his photograms, he also experimented with techniques such as solarization and image overlapping. He became friend of Schwitters, Moholy-Nagy, El Lissitzky and Archipenko. After WWII he made a photographic report – the Dresden Totentanz – to condemn Dresden bombing. In his late career he experimented also with chemical painting and camera-less photography.
El Lissitzky (Lazar Markovich Lissitzky) / Kurt Schwitters / László Moholy-Nagy
Edmund Kesting

Mary Wigman

Original photography / Gelatin silver print / 22.6 x 30.3 cm / 1935 / © 2020 / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York / VG Bild-Kunst, Germany

Edmund Kesting

Firestorm (Feuersturm)

Negative montage / Original photography / Gelatin silver print / 24.5 x 34.3 cm / 1945 / © 2020 / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York / VG Bild-Kunst, Germany

Edmund Kesting / Germaine Krull / Philippe Soupault / Maurice Tabard / László Moholy-Nagy / Man Ray (Emmanuel Radnitzky) / Tristan Tzara

Bifur

Magazine / 18.5 x 24 cm / Paris, 1929-1931

Edmund Kesting

Siren alarm

Negative montage with portrait of dancer Marianne Vogelsang / Original photography / Gelatin silver print / 24.5 x 34.3 cm / 1945 / © 2020 / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York / VG Bild-Kunst, Germany

Edmund Kesting

Composition 1

From La Lune en Rodage III / Original woodcut / 27.9 x 27.9 cm / 1977 / © 2020 / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York / VG Bild-Kunst, Germany

Edmund Kesting

Javanese dancer from the Wigman school (Javanischer Tänzer der Wigman-Schule)

Original photography / Gelatin silver print / 22.4 x 30.8 cm / 1933 / © 2020 / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York / VG Bild-Kunst, Germany

Edmund Kesting

Dore Hoyer. Ballet

Original photography / Gelatin silver print / 22.5 x 30 cm / 1947 / © 2020 / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York / VG Bild-Kunst, Germany

Edmund Kesting

Palucca student in Dresden (Palucca-Schülerin in Dresden)

Original photography / Gelatin silver print / 22.4 x 29.4 cm / 1947 / © 2020 / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York / VG Bild-Kunst, Germany

Edmund Kesting

Dead and rubble (Tote und Trümmer)

Negative-positive montage / Original photography / Gelatin silver print / 24.4 x 34.4 cm / 1945 / © 2020 / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York / VG Bild-Kunst, Germany

Edmund Kesting

Dance of the deads (Toten-Reigen)

Negative montage / Original photography / Gelatin silver print / 24.5 x 34.3 cm / 1945 / © 2020 / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York / VG Bild-Kunst, Germany

Edmund Kesting

Death over Dresden. View over the skeleton from the anatomy room of the art academy on the ruins of the Frauenkirche (Tod über Dresden. Blick über Skelett vom Anatomiesaal der Kunstakademie auf Trümmer der Frauenkirche)

Negative-positive montage with drawing / Original photography / Gelatin silver print / 24.6 x 34.4 cm / 1945 / © 2020 / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York / VG Bild-Kunst, Germany