Brett Weston

Brett Weston (December 16, 1911—January 22, 1993) was an American photographer and grew up in LA. He was the second son of photographer Edward Weston. Van Deren Coke, former curator of the San Francisco Museum of Art referred to Brett Weston as the "child genius of American photography." Brett began taking photographs in 1925 and lived in Mexico with Tina Modotti and Edward Weston. He had his first international exhibition at Film und Foto in Germany at age 17 and his first one-man museum retrospective at age 21 at the De Young Museum in San Francisco.

Brett had an intuitive very sophisticated sense of abstraction, often flattening the plane and engaging in layered space, an artistic style more commonly seen among modern painters like David Hockney than other photographers. He is best known for his work on the dunes around Oceano, California, a location that he later shared with his father Edward Weston, who never learned to drive. He preferred the high gloss papers and ensuing sharp clarity of the gelatin silver photographic materials of the f64 Group rather than the platinum matte photographic papers common in the 1920's and encouraged Edward Weston to explore the new silver papers in his own work. Brett Weston was credited by renowned photographic historian Beaumont Newhall as the first photographer to make negative space the subject of a photograph. Don Ross, a photographer close to both Brett and Edward, said that Brett never came after anyone. He was a true photographic equal and colleague to his father.

"Brett and I are always seeing the same kinds of things to do - we have the same kind of vision. Brett didn't like this; naturally enough, he felt that even when he had done the thing first, the public would not know and he would be blamed for imitating me." Edward Weston - Daybooks - May 24, 1930.

Brett used to refer to Edward Weston lovingly as "my biggest fan" and there was no rivalry between the two photographic giants. Brett loyally set aside his own photography to help Edward after he was unable to print his own images due to Parkinson's disease, which claimed Edward's life in 1958.

Brett Weston married and divorced four times. He had one daughter, Erica Weston.

Brett Weston lived part time on the Big Island of Hawaii the final 14 years of his life, as well as in Carmel, California. He maintained a home in Waikoloa that was built by his brother Neil Weston, and later moved to Hawaii Paradise Park. He died in Kona Hospital in January, 1993 after suffering a massive stroke.

In November of 1996, Oklahoma City collector Christian Keesee acquired from the Brett Weston Estate the most complete body of Weston’s work in existence. One of the primary goals of the Archive is to organize and catalog the collection in such a way as to offer immediate access to recognized as well as unknown and unpublished photographs by Brett Weston. A catalogue raisonne documenting each and every print in the collection with all attributable information on the photographs is currently underway, with a database available for research via the internet.

Works by Brett Weston are included in collections of the Colorado Springs Fine Arts Center, the Honolulu Academy of Arts, the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, the Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, the Oklahoma City Museum of Art and the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art.

Publications

• “A Restless Eye: A Biography of Photographer Brett Weston” Erica Weston Editions, MO 2011, ISBN 978-0-615-41361-7
• "Brett Weston: Out of the Shadow", ed. Stephen Bennett Phillips, Oklahoma City Museum of Art, OK, 2008, ISBN 978-0911919097
• "Fifteen Photographs, Brett Weston" (Afterword by Roger Aikin), Lodima Press, PA 2007, ASIN: B0012FZNJA
• "New York, Brett Weston" (Introduction by Beaumont Newhall, Afterword by Roger Aikin), Lodima Press, PA 2006, ASIN: B000T4CSUM
• "White Sands, Brett Weston" (Introduction by Nancy Newhall, Afterword by Roger Aikin), Lodima Press, PA 2005, ISBN 188889931X
• "San Francisco, Brett Weston" (Afterword by Roger Aikin), Lodima Press, PA 2004, ISBN 978-1888899160
• "Dune: Edward and Brett Weston", ed. Kurt Markus, Wild Horse Island Press, MT, 2003, ISBN 0-9677321-2-3
• "Hawaii: Fifty Photographs, Brett Weston", Photography West Graphics, CA, 1992, ISBN 0-9616515-4-7
• "Brett Weston: Master Photographer, Brett Weston", Photography West Graphics, CA, 1989, ISBN 0-9616515-3-9
• "Brett Weston: A Personal Selection, Brett Weston", Photography West Graphics, CA, 1986 ISBN 0-9616515-0-4
• "Brett Weston: Photographs from Five Decades", ed. RH Cravens, Aperture, NY, 1980, ISBN 978-0893810658
• "Brett Weston: Voyage of the Eye, Brett Weston", Aperture, NY, 1975, ISBN 978-0912334844
• "Brett Weston: Photographs", Merle Armitage, E. Weyhe, NY, 1956, ASIN: B0007DEJP2

External links

• Brett Weston Archive
• Brett Weston on artnet Monographs
• Edward-Weston.com
• Biography
• The Brett Weston Archive is currently represented by Bruce Silverstein Gallery, New York,NY.
• Photography West - Brett Weston Biography, Books, Photographs