Richard Avedon: Facing West

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Some photos that have been unseen since the original shows in 1985 are on display at a new show curated by Richard Avedon's granddaughter, Caroline, at Gagosian Grosvenor Hill in London until 14/03/2026.

www.theguardian.com

Go west! Richard Avedon’s working class heroes – in pictures

From crying miners to birthday girls via a body therapist and a meat packer, portraits from Richard Avedon’s celebrated series In the American West are on show in a new exhibition curated by his granddaughter
www.theguardian.com www.theguardian.com

And here's the link to the Gagosian website.

gagosian.com

Richard Avedon: Facing West, Grosvenor Hill, London, January 15–March 14, 2026

Find out more about the current exhibition Richard Avedon: Facing West at Grosvenor Hill, London. Installation views, works, editorial content, press, and more.
gagosian.com gagosian.com

I've had Richard Avedon's book In the American West since 1985, though I haven't looked at it for a while. I originally bought it as a birthday present for a very dear friend, Gill, but she didn't like it so she gave it to me for my birthday.
Haunting images.
 
Thank you very much for sharing this. I will add it to my list to visit. I've got a copy of Laura Wilson's book about the making of the project. It's not cheap but well worth it. She was one of Avedon's assistants on the project and the book has some wonderful behind the scenes pictures. I often wonder whether any of the other 800+ portraits which didn't make the final edit will ever be seen by the world.
 
I’m off to this exhibition this weekend. I’m looking forward to it.
 
The scale of the project was quite staggering, Wikipedia states 'The project lasted five years and concluded with both an exhibition and a catalogue. It allowed Avedon and his crew to photograph 762 people and expose approximately 17,000 sheets of 8×10 Kodak Tri-X Pan film.'
 
Nas said:
Nice one. Please report back. It's on my list.
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Went to visit the exhibition yesterday nas. Very big prints that are either printed on Metal sheets or mounted on it. I liked how he was able to get the sitter to feel comfortable and not have a tense feel to them. A good selection of different people. It was interesting to see people from 70’s and 80’s, made me think how people have changed.

I went to the national gallery the day before and maybe looking at paintings that are very layered in storytelling made me feel a little, underwhelmed “maybe”, I’m undecided. I’m going to go again with the misses and see how I feel again. It could be the plane white background, I’m not sure. Can’t put my finger on it so I’m going again. Definitely worth experiencing.

Oh for anyone who is interested the exhibition has been extended until April due to popular demand.
 
Soulstar89 said:
Went to visit the exhibition yesterday nas. Very big prints that are either printed on Metal sheets or mounted on it. I liked how he was able to get the sitter to feel comfortable and not have a tense feel to them. A good selection of different people. It was interesting to see people from 70’s and 80’s, made me think how people have changed.

I went to the national gallery the day before and maybe looking at paintings that are very layered in storytelling made me feel a little, underwhelmed “maybe”, I’m undecided. I’m going to go again with the misses and see how I feel again. It could be the plane white background, I’m not sure. Can’t put my finger on it so I’m going again. Definitely worth experiencing.

Oh for anyone who is interested the exhibition has been extended until April due to popular demand.
Click to expand...
Thank you. I went today and really enjoyed it. Well worth the visit. I asked about the prints and was told they're silver gelatin prints bonded to the metal sheets. None of the negs have been printed after 2004 and a lot of them no longer exist. I think a big archive of Avedon's negs may have been stored in one of the World Trade Center towers or if it wasn't him it was some other well known photographer.

Avedon said he chose the white background because he didn't want anything to distract from the person in the frame. I can see what he meant. The size of the prints was impressive and I couldn't help think about what it must have been like to work at that size, dodging and burning and then develop such big prints. The gallery has so much space, I wished we could have seen more prints from the series.

I also visited the Nan Goldin and Gordon Parks exhibitions, the latter being a must see. It's only on until mid April at Alison Jacques gallery.
 
Oh next time do drop me a message when you are next in London. Would be great to catch up.

I attempted to go back to the avedon exhibition and also go to Gordon parks and the Deutsche boërse exhibition at the photographers gallery but when we came out of the underground at Bond Street it’s was raining so hard that we decided to canceled the plans.

It’s fascinating that the negative have not been printed since 2004.

I found it interesting that avedon seemed to meter the light skin either zone 5 or maybe 1/3 stop over. Could be how it was printed but I noticed the darker look.

I plan to try again tomorrow or next week.
 
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