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Cage 678
Gisèle Freund
Papers, 1933-1990
| Back to Finding Aids | |
| Washington State University Libraries Manuscripts, Archives, and Special Collections Pullman, WA 99164-5610 USA (509) 335-6691 Inquiries |
Cage 678
Gisèle Freund
Papers, 1933-1990
Washington State University Libraries purchased this collection of Gisèle Freund Papers from dealer George Robert Minkoff in 1999. The archive was previously in the possession of Joan Daves’s family (Joan Daves was Freund’s American literary agent). Stephen Youngkin organized and processed the collection in March of 2001, under the supervision of Manuscripts Librarian Robert N. Matuozzi, who also edited the finding aid.
Number of containers: 1
Linear feet of shelf space: .5
Biography
While Gisèle Freund’s birthdate is cited as either 1908 or 1912, it is certain she was born in the Schöneberg district of Berlin, Germany, to wealthy Jewish parents who had a passion for collecting art. Her father’s gift of a camera to the fifteen-year-old Gisèle set the course of her life. During her university years in Frankfurt, where she studied sociology, Freund took an active political stand again National Socialism. Forced to flee Germany in 1933, she landed in Paris with little more than a suitcase containing her camera and some photographic documentation of Nazi violence. At the Sorbonne her doctoral studies emphasized the history of nineteenth century French photography. Her friendship with Adrienne Monnier, the proprietress of La Maison des Amis des Livres bookshop (which published her dissertation) provided Freund with access to the literary elite of Paris.
The exigency to make a living led Freund to photography as a serious vocation. Life magazine published some of Freund’s early projects in the mid-1930s. Other significant commissions from that period include the dust jacket photographs for the first hard cover editions of André Malraux’s Man’s Fate (1935) and James Joyce’s Finnegans Wake (1939). In 1939, Freund had her first private showing at the Peggy Guggenheim Gallery in London. Though a naturalized French citizen, Freund fled occupied Paris in 1940, first to southern France and then to South America, where she continued her photographic assignments throughout the war. In 1947, she began a seven year association with Magnum, the photographic news agency established by Robert Capa and others, including Henri Cartier-Bresson. Freund’s first public exhibition was in 1975 in New York, at the Robert Schoelkopf Gallery. Three years later, Freund was awared the photokina Kulturpreis, and she was the first woman to receive the Grand Prix National des Arts in 1980. Gisèle Freund died in Paris on April 1, 2000.
Along with her documentary reportage, Freund is best known for her photographic portraits, many of them in color¾ which, she said, came "closer to life"¾ including studies of some of the greatest literary and artistic figures of the twentieth century. This list includes James Joyce, Samuel Beckett, George Bernard Shaw, H.G. Wells, Leonard and Virginia Woolf, André Malraux, Jean Cocteau, Marcel Duchamp, and Henri Matisse. Before photographing her subjects, she worked to earn their confidence by establishing a rapport with them. Her ability to capture "the essence of beings through their expressions" earned Gisèle Freund the reputation of being "one of the world's greatest photographers."
Arrangement and Description
The Gisèle Freund Papers consist primarily of correspondence and book reviews relating to her American publications that appeared in print between 1980 and 1985. The organizational arrangement of this collection has been imposed by the archivist, and consists of four series arranged in chronological order: Series 1, Publishing Projects and Correspondence, 1975-1990, consists of material relating to her published work, including correspondence between Freund and Joan Daves, her American literary agent, Freund’s introduction to Three Days with Joyce (1985), and other material relating to publishing rights, royalties, and contractual matters. Series 2, Photographs, 1933-1974, includes prints, proofs and mock-ups, chiefly relating to the publication of her photography books and photographic exhibitions. Series 3, Printed Material, 1968-1985, contains selected writings by and about Freund. Series 4, Biographical and Provenance Material, 1982-2000, includes clippings and copies from encyclopedia entries.