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30 KANE, Art. “A Great Day in Harlem”: lifetime print inscribed by photographer Art Kane. New York: 1958
one of the greatest jazz photographs – inscribed
Perhaps the iconic jazz photograph and one of the most extraordinary group shots in the history of photography. Inscribed below the image at lower right: “For my friend Arville, Art Kane”. Lifetime prints are certainly not common and those inscribed or signed are decidedly scarce. Around 10 a.m. on the morning of 12 August 1958 Art Kane, a freelancer working for Esquire , captured this unforgettable image of some 57 “living legends” of jazz gathered in front of a brownstone at 17 East 126th Street, between Fifth and Madison in Harlem. “Art Kane was not a photographer but an accomplished art director when Esquire magazine hired him to shoot his first professional photograph in 1958. Esquire art director Robert Benton was planning an all-jazz issue, and suggested to his boss that they hire Kane for the shoot. Benton thought Kane showed promise – and he loved jazz. It was Kane’s idea to create an enormous photo spread of as many jazz greats as they could persuade to assemble. It was also Kane’s idea to shoot the photo on the steps of a brownstone in Harlem, an innovative solution to his lack of studio space … The assignment inspired Kane to begin his long career as an innovative photographer … In his thirty-six years as a photographer, Kane earned many awards and honors, including the American Society of Magazine Photographers Lifetime Achievement Award in 1984. Art Kane died at age 69 in 1995” (a-great-day-in-harlem website). The headliners in this famous “class photograph” would be Count Basie, Coleman Hawkins, Lester Young, Thelonious Monk, Dizzy Gillespie, Charles Mingus, Sonny Rollins, Gerry Mulligan, Mary Lou Williams, Maxine Sullivan, Horace Silver, Art Farmer, Benny Golson, alongside a constellation of drummers: Art Blakey, Gene Krupa, Sonny Greer and Jo Jones. This print may date to the 1970s, as a print of Kane’s portrait of Andy Warhol as the Golden Boy, also inscribed to Arville and dated 1977, was offered at Christie’s, New York in 2017. Original glossy silver gelatin print, overall: 410 × 505 mm; image: 345 × 490 mm; framed and glazed. In excellent condition. £5,750 [121696]
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THE JAZZ COLLECTION
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