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Henry B. Goodwin was a mysterious person, who worked within several apparently inconsistent professions with an indefatigable glow. Firstly as a highly expert linguistic researcher, then as a fearless debater, photographer and author, and lastly in his life as an innovative gardening expert. Still, it is as a photographer that he makes his greatest impression, despite only a few years in this profession.

In 1915, he opened his ”Kamerabilder” studio (The Pictorial Portrait Studio) in Stockholm, which quickly became the fashionable studio for the country’s cultural elite. Between the years 1917 and 1920, he produced, through his own publishing company, three deluxe publications, all exclusively printed in photogravure and in limited editions of 200-250 copies. In the first two books, he presented a selection of the best studio portraits of his early years, showing artists, writers and actors.

The third book, ”Our beautiful Stockholm,” was a poetic photographic documentation of Stockholm during the time around the First World War. The photos were subtle in their charming ordinariness and they provide an impression emerging from hours of afternoon walks with no real destination.

Goodwin’s esthetic method was to distance himself from the camera’s ability to mechanically and realistically reproduce reality. He was instead inspired by the impressionists’ sensitive and melancholic dream world, where the creator’s inner images were translated into a time-consuming and demanding copy work. The photographs were taken using a camera that was small for the time and they underwent a typical processing procedure in the spirit of pictorialism. Goodwin made it clear that it was the photographer, and not the camera, that gave the photo its soul.

Like no other Scandinavian photographer, Goodwin enjoyed a positive international reputation. Condé Nast, New York publisher of the magazines Vogue and Vanity Fair was always on the lookout for new, gifted photographers. He knew about Goodwin and invited him over to New York. However, no cooperation ensued, probably because the romantic style represented by Goodwin had gone out of fashion in the US and had been replaced by a new type of photography with greater optical sharpness and exactness.

In Sweden, Goodwin became the most expressionistic supporter of pictorialism. His range of talents, his goal-oriented energy, his challenging self-confidence and his originality, marked his undisputed special position. Overall, he strengthened the status of photography as a fully-fledged art form, something that nobody else had previously done in Sweden.


Exhibitions
One-man Show (selected)

1914 - Varias Konstsalong, Stockholm, Sweden
1917 - Little Gallery, London, invited by the magazine The Amateur Photographer.
1918 - B.T.Centralen, Copenhagen, Denmark. invited by ’Berlingske Tidende’ in Copenhagen, with 150 pictures showed in the exhibition hall of the newspaper.
1912 - The Brown-Robertson Galleries at Madison Avenue, New York. The exhibition continued same year to Boston, Chicago and Los Angeles, USA.
1923 - The Royal Photographic Society, Russell Square, London
1989 - Stockholms Stadsmuseum, Stockholm, Sweden
1997 - Fotomässan, Gothenburg, Sweden
1998 - Liljewalchs Konsthall, Stockholm, Sweden
2000 - Gallery Bilder till Salu, Stockholm, Sweden.

Group Exhibitions (selected)

1914 - The Baltic Exhibition, Malmoe , Sweden.
1916 - The London Salon, Royal Water Colour Society, London.
1917 - The London Salon International Exhibition, also the years 1919, 1920, 1921, 1923 and 1925.
1920 - The Third International Photographic Salon, arranged by The Camera Pictorialists of Los Angeles.
1922 - Salon Internacional De Fotografia, Italy
1922 - The Fifth International Photographic Salon, arranged by The Camera Pictorialists of Los Angeles.
1926 - ’Den Första Internationella Fotografiska Salongen’, Stockholm.
1928 - Fotografiska Föreningens utställning, ’Den Andra Internationella Fotografiska Salongen’, Stockholm.
1930 - The Royal Photographic Society, London
Terzo ”Salon” Italiano d’Arte Fotografica Internazionale i Italien.





Books
Publications (Selected)

1917 Konstnärsporträtt. Own publishing company.
1918 Anders de Wahl. En Festskrift. Own publishing company.
1918 Jenny Hasselqvist. Lars Hökerbergs Förlag
1920 Vårt vackra Stockholm. Own publishing company.
1924 Troll och Tott och deras vänner. Albert Bonniers Förlag.
1925 Hennes höghet av New York. P.A.Norstedt & Söner.
1925 Täppan som sommarnöje. Albert Bonniers Förlag.
1928 Doktor Goodwins lilla katekes. Albert Bonniers Förlag.
1929 Kamerabilden. Albert Bonniers Förlag.

Reference books in Swedish

- Söderberg, Rolf / Rittsel, Pär, 1983, Den svenska fotografins historia., Stockholm: Bonnier Fakta.
- Söderberg, Rolf, 1988: Henry B. Goodwin-Piktorialist och porträttör., Laholm: Aktuell Fotografi.
- Östlind, Olle, 1997: Den okände Henry B Goodwin, Borås: Carlsson Bokförlag 1997.
- Ehrs, Bruno / Bengtsson, Carl, 1998: Goodwin, en hyllning, Värnamo: Norstedts Förlag AB.
- Ehrs, Bruno, 1999: Goodwins vackra Stockholm., Stockholm: Apokromat Förlag.

Reference books in English

- Contemporary Photographers, 1981: Wigh, Leif, Goodwin, Henry Buergel, Detroit: St. James Press.
- The Frozen image, 1982: Wigh, Leif, Goodwin, Henry Buergel, Minneapolis: Walker Art Center.
- Macmillan biographical encyclopedia of photographic artists & innovators , 1983: Sign. unknown, Goodwin, Henry Buergel, New York : Macmillan.
- Söderberg, Rolf, 1988: Henry B. Goodwin-Pictorialist and Portraitist, Laholm: Aktuell Fotografi.
- Ehrs, Bruno / Bengtsson, Carl, 1998: Goodwin, A Tribute, Värnamo: Norstedts Förlag AB.

CV
1878 - Heinrich Karl Hugo Bürgel was born in Munich, Germany, on February 20, 1878.
1888 - Learned to take photographs, aged 10 years.
1899 - Continued his studies at the University of Leipzig.
- Was at the same time a student of the renowned German photographer, Nicola Perscheid.
1901-1902 - Works on his doctoral degree in Copenhagen and Leipzig.
1903 - Received his doctoral degree after a public defense on the subject “Konungsannáll.
Annales Islandorum Regii,” which involved a review and an exact description of an old Icelandic handwriting style, which is preserved at the Royal Library in Copenhagen.
1904 - Moves from Germany to the university city of Uppsala in Sweden.
- Changes surname to Goodwin.
1906 - Becomes lecturer in German at the University of Uppsala.
1907 - Goodwin makes his debut at the ”Photographic Uppsala Exhibition,” with works that include portraits, and receives acclaim in the daily newspapers and photographic press.
1909 - Moves to Stockholm.
- Is presented in the Fotografisk Tidskrift (”Photographic Journal”) in the article ”Amateur photographers as portrait-takers,” which includes six of his photographs.
1912 - Goodwin is given full-time employment with the P A Norstedts & Söner publishing company.
- Goodwin starts as a photography writer in the journal Svenska Fotografen (”The Swedish Photographer”).
1914 - Opens his own studio, The Pictorial Portrait Studio, in Stockholm.
- Goodwin starts as a writer for the British annual publication Photograms of the Year, in 1914. He writes from 1914 until 1921, as well as in 1923 and 1929.
- Goodwin meets Alvin Langdon Coburn in the UK in spring 1914. At that time, he certainly has the opportunity to discuss Coburn’s books “London” and “New York” from 1909-10, each with some 20 photographs presented in hand-printed photogravure and the exclusive portrait volume, “Men of Mark” from 1913, with more than 80 portraits of famous persons of the day in hand-printed photogravure. Between 1917 and 1920, Goodwin published three masterpieces with portraits and city environment photographs that had many similarities with Coburn’s books.
1915 - Goodwin’s debut exhibition on November 24, 1915, in Varia’s Art Gallery,
Stockholm. 1,500 visitors and 800 catalogs sold during two weeks.
1917 - Goodwin’s first deluxe publication, Konstnärsporträtt (Artist’s portrait), is published in March.
1919 - Goodwin’s second deluxe publication, Anders de Wahl - en festskrift (“Anders de Wahl - a celebration”).
- Elected fellow of the London Salon of Photography
1920 - Receives international recognition when he is appointed fellow of the
Royal Photographic Society in London.
- Goodwin’s third masterpiece, Our beautiful Stockholm.
1921 - Travels to the US at the invitation of Condé Nast, publisher of Vogue and Vanity Fair. As the guest of the publishing company, Goodwin spent a three-month work and exhibition period in the US form January to March.
- The Pictorial Photographers of America, of which Clarence H. White was
president, organizes a party in Goodwin’s honor, in conjunction with Goodwin’s
exhibition at The Brown-Robertson Galleries on Madison Avenue.
1922 - Invited by The Royal Photographic Society in London to exhibit his collection of USA photographs at the R.P.S. premises in Russell Square during April 1922.
He also gives three lectures in conjunction with the exhibition, Naked versus
Nude, on April 7 before the R.P.S. Pictorial Group; Portraiture Pure and
Simple, at the R.P.S. monthly meeting on April 11, and Photographic Portraiture versus Artistic Bluff at a meeting of The Anglo-Swedish Society on April 12.
- Separate exhibition in the studio at Bragevägen in October 1922 of the photographs from the US and London.
1924 - The International Photography Exhibition at Liljewalchs Art Gallery takes place in January 1924. Member of the exhibition committee and also exhibits his own work.
1929 - Publishes an instruction book on photography Kamerabilden - En orientering för envar med
ett hundratal praktiska vinkar (“The camera image – An orientation for everyone with a hundred practical angles”), which he calls “my confession.”
- Appointed judge and lecturer at the International photography Exhibition in Gothenburg.
1931 - Separate exhibition with photographs form the exhibition in Rome and photographs from the journey to Italy is shown at the studio on Biblioteksgatan in May 1931.
- Henry B. Goodwin dies on September 11, 1931, as a result of complications related to a broken leg sustained at the beginning of the summer, at only 53 years old.

Represented
Königliche Kunstgewerbemuseum, Berlin, Germany (1916)
Moderna Museet, Stockholm.
Kungliga Biblioteket, Stockholm.
Stockholms Stadsmuseum, Stockholm.