Horst P. Horst- how must the world have looked to him? Ivan Terestchenko-what does he see that I always miss?
Surely great photographers are given extra sight sensors. I often look at their images and wonder. In a collection of Horst photographs of his own garden at Oyster Bay Cove, Long Island (House and Garden 1969 Dec.) & the book The Garden Room* with Ivan's own photographs of the Horst garden- we get to glimpse of the photographers' work. What did they see?
Horst by Horst and Horst by Terestchenko at Oyster Bay
Still Life with Flowers and Bocklin
by Horst-c.1959 Oyster Bay
Ivan included this Horst photograph in his Horst profile
Horst made this pergola a part of his summer living space- just off of his study. The latticing has been sawn away at points to create a Chinese Chippendale pattern. How fabulous is that! Other details in the room-a slash of red curtain, a red lacquer table and the simple still life on the table show Horst style as utterly timeless.
Horst 1969
Ivan's photograph of the same room reveals some changes but the same casual perfection is in residence 25 years later. Visible in both photographs: the low plaster seating that is a part of the pavilion's structure. The repetition of solid colour cushions in bright orange and yellow are in principle acting as the red and orange does in Horst's own photograph of the room- a punctuation to nature.
Ivan's photograph
Horst's photograph of British artists Gilbert and George
planted on a low seat like the one above
Oyster Bay, c.1976
Ivan and Horst chatting in the Garden living room at Oyster Bay
Ivan's portrait of Horst
In an interview with Ivan he said- I met him in his home in Oyster Bay. Wouldn't dare to photograph him, so I sketched him instead.
one of Horst's Oyster Bay photographs
VOGUE fashion shoot c.1950
Horst's Oyster Bay in 1969, By this time Horst had been cultivating the grounds for 20 years. The simple white house- Horst's own design, is based on a Tunisian one and is enveloped by green. The grounds were once a part of a park on the Louis Comfort Tiffany estate.
Dachshunds obviously filled both photographers' lens. Horst photo above
and Ivan's watercolour homage to Horst and his dachshund Maxie.
Ivan's drawing of the property
One of my favourite of Ivan's photographs is below-
Two marble chairs, made for Napoleon's Venetian palazzo by a stream
(both depicted in the drawing)
One of my favourite of Ivan's photographs is below-
Two marble chairs, made for Napoleon's Venetian palazzo by a stream
(both depicted in the drawing)
A classical Horst Still Life
composed at Oyster Bay, c.1989
Ivan's photograph of a lushly planted stream (above)
&
Horst's photograph below
From the 1969 House and Garden article: 'The woods produces an annual succession of wild flowers: yellow marsh marigold and scarlet cardinal flower, white boneset and pink joe-pye weed, rose mallow and iris, mauve pickerel weed, orange Turk's-cap and day lily, basard pennyroyal, meadow rue. Horst welcomes whatever grows, '
'As one gets older, there are fewer and fewer plants one doesn't like.'
Horst photograph
One of Five radiating allees- the Center allee
lined with yews and hemlocks
One of Five radiating allees- the Center allee
lined with yews and hemlocks
When Timothy Mawson author of The Garden Room interviewed Horst he asked:
What he considered the greatest luxury in life?- Horst replied :
"Simplicity"
(One might add-)
& an eye for beauty.
.
*The Garden Room by Tim Mawson.
Read the little augury interview with Ivan here
add'l Horst photographs from HORST, Sixty Years of Photography- Kazmaier
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