Rogi Andre

From Hungarian background, Rosa Klein, known as Rogi André, settled in Paris in 1920. From the beginning of her career, she portrayed famous artists and in 1934 her work endowed her with a certain reputation. Unlike many other photographers of the time, she was the one who would make her way to her clients. She portrayed famous personalities such as Dora Maar (Picasso’s companion), the painters Balthus and Kandinsky, the writer Antonin Artaud and many others. Rogi André also initiated the American photographer Lisette Model into using the Rolleiflex. She got married to the photographer André Kertesz, and even though their marriage did not last long, she stated that she had never forgotten his invaluable advice: " Don’t ever shoot what you don’t love (feel passionate about) ". She made a series of clichés of Jacqueline Lamba, André Breton’s partner, who was a famous aquatic dancer in a Parisian cabaret of the time. With the help of lenses specially modified by André Kertesz and with the use of a mirror, she managed to highlight the secret and suggestive forms of a body in water. These beautiful images, which decompose symmetry, negate the unique shape of every thing.