CHICAGO.- This month, the Museum of Contemporary Photography, Columbia College Chicago will open André Kertész: On Reading, a hallmark collection of street photography that celebrates the absorptive power of reading as a universal pleasure, and In Sight, an exhibition that highlights important works added to the permanent collection in the past five years. Both exhibitions serve to illustrate the breadth and quality of the museum’s 7,000 strong collection of photographs and related media while inhabiting playful approaches to the interpretation, or “reading,” of images.

André Kertész, born in Budapest, Hungary (1894 - 1984), was and is widely acknowledged as a mentor and main influence by photographers and artists in other media of his generation. Henri Cartier-Bresson once stated on behalf of himself, Robert Capa, and Brassaï, “Whatever we have done, Kertész did first.” The body of photographs, recently donated to the museum by Mr. Richard Hanson, was made between the early 1920s and the late 1960s in Hungary, France, and the United States, recording Kertész’s public observations of the private act of reading. Approximately half were published in the book On Reading (Grossman, New York) in 1971; MoCP will assist the estate with an expanded re-publication in the coming year.