NEW YORK.- A rare portrait of Edward Weston, two complete Ansel Adams portfolios and a selection of turn-of-the-century Native American photographs from a private collection highlight Christie’s spring sale of Photographs at Rockefeller Center on April 18.  The auction also will offer a customarily wide variety of images – comprising a spectrum of unique, rare and iconic prints – by the medium’s greatest practitioners, including Edward Sheriff Curtis, Edward Steichen, Man Ray, Irving Penn, Hiroshi Sugimoto and Vik Muniz. 



Edward Weston, 1921, a portrait by Margrethe Mather, is the sale’s cover lot.  A photographer celebrated in her time but often overlooked historically, Margrethe Mather met Weston in Los Angeles in 1913, and in the following years became his model, collaborator, lover and teacher.  While early works by Mather are considered highly rare, the present portrait, an exquisite platinum print, is also believed to be a unique work.



Among the sale’s top lots is a particularly striking example of a Man Ray Rayograph of 1926 (estimate: $100,000-150,000).  Originally from the collection of René Laporte, publisher of the important Surrealist journal Les Cahiers Libres, this rare, oversized example of Man Ray’s celebrated photogram technique is a classic Surrealist composition.