László Moholy-Nagy

László Moholy-Nagy Xanti Schawinsky, Ascona 1927 Vintage gelatin silver print. 17.4 x 23.3 cm (18.2 x 24.1 cm). Inscribed 'unter der dusche' (under the shower) in pencil, photographer's stamp and 'Edition 'Tilleul'. Paris' stamp as well as numbered in an unknown hand in pencil on the verso. - Traces of usage. Matted. Provenance Estate of Xanti Schawinsky; private collcetion, Switzerland Literature Hans Heinz Holz, Xanti Schawinsky. Bewegung im Raum. Bewegung des Raums, Zurich 1981, ill. p. 34; Peter Hahn (ed.), Xanti Schawinsky. Malerei, Bühne, Grafikdesign, Fotografie, Berlin 1986, ill. p. 18 (each 'Basler Illustrierte', front cover); Jeannine Fiedler (ed.), Moholy Album. Perspektivwechsel auf den Fotostrecken der Moderne. Lászlo Moholy-Nagys schwarzweißfotografische Arbeiten 1924-1937, Göttingen 2018, ill. p. 156 (album page) The photograph was taken in 1927 during the first of several trips Moholy-Nagy made to Ascona in the Swiss canton of Ticino, where several Bauhaus members, including Walter Gropius, Herbert Bayer, Oskar Schlemmer and Xanti Schawinsky, as well as other artists and writers, spent the summer. The image was used on the cover of the 4 August 1933 edition of 'Basler Illustrierte' with the title ‘Unter der Douche [Under the Shower]’ (fig.1). This later designation is misleading in that the photograph, as seen on the corresponding page in Moholy-Nagy's album (fig. 2), was not taken in the shower but on the beach as part of a frolicsome group game: 'Sun worshippers invoking a sun god', Moholy-Nagy titled the game in his notes. A tight circle of bathers, among them Schawinsky, sit with hands raised around a central standing figure. For this published print, Moholy-Nagy chose a detail that turns the original group shot into a cheerful, close-up portrait of his Bauhaus colleague. Assuming that the publication as a portrait format in 1933 - a common practice in the photo agencies of that time - was made with the photographer's consent, this procedure could be understood as evidence of Moholy-Nagy's postulate that a good photograph should 'work' from different points of view. We thank Dr. Jeannine Fiedler, Berlin, for helpful information.