Nicholas Nixon

Life Work

Nicholas Nixon

In the summer of 1975, Nicholas Nixon took a picture of his girlfriend, Bebe, and her three sisters. One year later, at one of the sisters’ graduation parties, he took another picture of the four women, and another every year since. His work tells the story of a moment, of transience, and of the sisters’ changing relationships to each other. As such, it also narrates the story of the essence of photography. Each group picture becomes steeped in déjà-vu; the series of images makes the time passed visible. Nixon’s works are invariably black-and-white, they document the constants of being human: life and death, love and loss, stasis and change, being and ceasing to be. His images from Boston, New York, and Cambridge are sociograms of their time, just like his series of portraits showing the sick, or of AIDS patients. C/O Berlin is showing Nicholas Nixon’s complete oeuvre for the first time. It will feature works from his "The Brown Sisters" series, alongside his urban images such as "New Topographics" and "City Views", his portraits, self-portraits and still lifes. The exhibition was organized by Fundación MAPFRE in collaboration with C/O Berlin.