Saul Leiter (1923–2013) is one of the most celebrated pioneers of colour photography. He is the subject of a major retrospective at Foam Amsterdam this winter. An Unfinished World offers an intimate retrospective of Leiter’s extensive oeuvre, spanning over 200 works of photography – both black-and-white and colour – as well as his lesser-known but equally compelling abstract paintings. This exhibition, organised in collaboration with Les Rencontres d’Arles and diChroma Photography, promises to be a comprehensive exploration of a visionary artist who transformed ordinary moments into transcendent art.
For nearly six decades, Leiter’s daily walks through New York City provided an endless canvas for experimentation. Known for his ability to craft painterly compositions from urban life, Leiter’s work is a symphony of shadow, light and reflection. A red umbrella, a fleeting taxi, or rain-slicked windows became his tools for creating layered abstractions. Leiter’s affinity for imperfection – aged film, spontaneous framing and unconventional techniques – gave his work a poetic sense of serendipity.
Leiter was a rare figure in the 1940s and 1950s, when colour photography was largely relegated to commercial use. At a time when black-and-white dominated the artistic scene, he embraced colour as an expressive medium, lending the images a warmth and vitality that were revolutionary. The use of telephoto lenses added intimacy and a painterly softness to the frames, transforming mundane street scenes into timeless narratives. Once lost to obscurity, Leiter’s work was rediscovered in the mid 2010s for its ground-breaking role in the emergence of colour photography. It was not until the 2006 book Early Color (Steidl/Howard Greenberg Gallery) was published that a renaissance occurred and his contributions to the history of photography gained widespread acclaim. Today, he is celebrated as a central figure in the New York School of photography and a visionary who reshaped the potential of colour photography as art.
Teju Cole, author and art critic, highlights Leiter’s unique approach to urban photography in AnOther Magazine: “Leiter was uninterested in the broad sweep of the urban spectacle; he was about little glimpses, fleeting details, passing beauty. His art was about subtleties of feeling and composition.” Cole’s observation underscores Leiter’s mastery of distilling the essence of city life into poetic fragments.
Leiter once said: “Photographs are often treated as important moments, but really they are fragments and souvenirs of an unfinished world.” This philosophy underpins the exhibition, which captures the quiet beauty of his daily observations, from snow-dusted cityscapes to the flicker of neon lights through fogged glass. Saul Leiter was also a lifelong painter, and his abstract forms echo the same themes found in his street photography: colour, texture and light. Upon his death in 2013, Leiter left behind an extraordinary archive of approximately 15,000 black-and-white prints, 40,000 colour slides and 4,000 paintings. Foam’s exhibition offers a rare opportunity to be immersed in a world driven by a multifaceted vision, and a daring rearrangement of the boundaries between photography and painting.
An Unfinished World runs until 23 April 2025. For those seeking inspiration in the subtle, everyday poetry of a master observer, this exhibition is a highlight of the year’s cultural calendar.
For more information, visit foam.org
Words: Anna Müller
Image Credits:
1. Harlem, 1960 © Saul Leiter / Saul Leiter Foundation. © Saul Leiter / Saul Leiter foundation.
2. Ana, 1950s © Saul Leiter Foundation.
3. Footprints, c. 1950 © Saul Leiter / Saul Leiter Foundation.
