The highlight of the autumn arts calendar arrives in A Coruña, Spain on November 18, planning on telling the story of the man behind the lens. Made in collaboration with the Helmut Newton Foundation and curated by Philippe Garner, Matthias Harder, and Tim Jefferies, the exhibition titled “Helmut Newton – Fact & Fiction” follows the six-decade career of the legendary photographer. 

Born in 1920 in Berlin to a Jewish family, Newton was fascinated with photography at an early age. In 1936, he started an apprenticeship with Yva (Elsie Ernestine Neülander-Simon), a fashion and portrait photographer in Berlin until Nazi oppression forced him into exile. From there on, Newton went on to have a career spanning six decades and forever leaving a mark in the world of photography.

The exhibition plans to showcase his life with a series of videos showing Newton at work and in conversation, personal images providing insights into his childhood, career, and partnership with his wife June, along with other posters, documents, cameras, equipment, props, artifacts and memorabilia. Newton’s bold visual language is also on display with a curation of his iconic ‘Big Nudes’ and memorable portraits of numerous amount of unique personalities —among them Andy Warhol, David Bowie, Margaret Thatcher, Yves Saint Laurent, and Karl Lagerfeld, to name a few. 

Although known for his famous fashion and style imagery, Newton’s lesser-known ‘landscapes’ work of Paris to LA, Monte-Carlo to Berlin, and Vienna to Las Vegas, will also be showcased. The exhibition is the third to be presented by Marta Ortega Pérez (MOP) Foundation, following the success of the Peter Lindbergh, and Steven Meisel exhibitions, which has enabled the foundation to create an artist-led education program where students master each photographer’s work. This comes as a long-term initiative for the region that aims to bring world-class culture to A Coruña.

“Helmut Newton is one of that celestial band of photographers whose images are instantly recognizable on their own,” says Marta Ortega Pérez in a statement. “His photographs were not only of his time but far ahead of his time – he spectacularly set the scene for those photographers who followed him.”

Helmut Newton – Fact & Fiction will be open from November 18, 2023, until May 1, 2024.

Heading Image: Helmut Newton, Elsa Peretti as a Bunny, Halston, New York, 1975 © Helmut Newton Foundation