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Peter Hujar, Orgasmic Man, 1969, pigmented ink print, image, 11 1/4 x 7 1/2" paper, 14 x 11" © The Peter Hujar Archive

Peter Hujar

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© The Peter Hujar Archive

Details:

b. 1934, Trenton, New Jersey
d. 1987, New York, New York

Peter Hujar photographed his subjects with penetrating sensitivity and psychological depth.

Unflinching and at times dark, he captured intellectuals, luminaries, and members of New York City subculture in moments of disarmed vulnerability. Hujar embraced male sexuality unabashedly and was unafraid to examine death and dying. In her introduction to Portraits in Life and Death, Susan Sontag wrote, “…Fleshed and moist-eyed friends and acquaintances stand, sit, slouch, mostly lie – and are made to appear to meditate on their own mortality…Peter Hujar knows that portraits in life are always, also, portraits in death.” Hujar was at the forefront of the group of artists, musicians, writers, and performers in downtown New York in the 1970s and early 80s. He succumbed to AIDS in 1987, leaving behind a complex and profound body of work that has become posthumously celebrated.

Hujar’s photographs have been exhibited throughout Europe and the United States, including at the Fotomuseum Winterthur, Switzerland; Grey Art Museum, New York University; Kunsthalle, Basel; P.S.1 Contemporary Art Center, Long Island City, New York; and the Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam for a retrospective in 1994. Exhibited and organized by the Morgan Library & Museum in New York and Fundación MAPFRE in Madrid starting in 2017, the exhibition Speed of Life made its final stop at the Galerie Nationale du Jeu de Paume in Paris in 2019. In 2021, Hujar’s work was subject of a solo exhibition at the FOMU – Fotomuseum Antwerp, Belgium. In 2024, as part of the Collateral Event of the 60th International Art Exhibition at the Venice Biennale, the Peter Hujar Foundation organized Peter Hujar: Portraits in Life and Death at the Istituto Santa Maria della Pietà, which is currently on view through November 2024. His work is held in the permanent collections of The Art Institute of Chicago; The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; The Museum of Modern Art, New York; San Francisco Museum of Modern Art; and Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, among many other institutions.

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Peter Hujar, David Wojnarowicz Smoking, 1981, pigmented ink print, image, 14 3/4 x 14 3/4", paper, 20 x 16" © The Peter Hujar Archive

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Peter Hujar, Christopher Street Pier #2 (Crossed Legs), 1976, pigmented ink print, image, 14 3/4 x 14 5/8" paper, 20 x 16" © The Peter Hujar Archive

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Peter Hujar, Dean Savard Reclining, 1984, vintage gelatin silver print, image, 14 3/4 x 14 3/4", paper, 20 x 16" © The Peter Hujar Archive

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Peter Hujar, Lynn Davis (Pulling Hair), 1981, vintage gelatin silver print, image, 14 5/8 x 14 3/4", paper, 20 x 16" © The Peter Hujar Archive

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Peter Hujar, Daniel Schook Sucking Toe (Close-up), 1981, pigmented ink print, image, 14 3/4 x 14 5/8", paper, 20 x 16" © The Peter Hujar Archive

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Peter Hujar, Mario Montez Backstage at the Palm Casino Review, 1974, vintage gelatin silver print, image, 13 1/2 x 13 1/4", paper, 17 x 14" © The Peter Hujar Archive