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Milena (Milena Vildová)

Josef Sudek (Czechoslovakian, 1896–1976)
1942

Medium/Technique Photograph, bromoil print
Dimensions Image: 16.5 x 12.1 cm (6 1/2 x 4 3/4 in.)
Platemark: 18.1 x 13.3 cm (7 1/8 x 5 1/4 in.)
Credit Line The Sonja Bullaty and Angelo Lomeo Collection of Josef Sudek Photographs
The Saundra B. Lane Photography Purchase Fund
Accession Number2003.166
NOT ON VIEW
CollectionsEurope, Photography
ClassificationsPhotographs
Josef Sudek is not often thought of as a photographer of people, but he did occasionally make portraits, nearly always of his small circle of close friends. Milena Vildova was a dancer and actress living in Prague who sometimes attended the musical evenings Sudek hosted in his studio to listen to recordings of his favorite classical composers. In his stunning bromoil print, Sudek has captured Vildova's expressive face just as she turns to look back over her shoulder, with light gently playing across her features. During World War II, Sudek made fewer of his better known landscapes of the city and its surrounding countryside, focusing instead on more personal subjects such as this-portraits, quiet interiors, and simple still lifes arranged on his windowsill.

InscriptionsRecto, in pencil, LL: Milena
Recto, in pencil, LR: Sudek 1945
ProvenanceThe artist; given to Sonja Bullaty and Angelo Lomeo in the 1960s or 1970s; from whom purchased by the MFA, April 23, 2003
Copyright© Anna Fárová