Summer and sea have been forever entwined in both the popular and the creative imagination. While paintings such as Waves Breaking by Monet or Beach Scene by Degas are iconic, there is also a seminal body of photography that explores the innate human connection to water. In the summer of 2016, the Munich Seaside exhibition united a sublime collection of images dedicated to the spirit of the sea. The show featured some of the most celebrated photographers of the past century including Édouard Boubat, Lee Miller, Erich Hartmann, Philippe Halsman, Erich Lessing, Gundula Friese, Petr Lovigin, Rudi Weissenstein, Tomasz Lazar, David “CHIM” Seymour, Thomas Dworzak, and Patrick Zachmann.

“The sea is profoundly physical yet also truly metaphysical in all that it inspires and evokes,” says CLAIR Gallery director Anna-Patricia Kahn. “This fusion of the tangible and the abstract is what makes it a perfect subject for photographers and it is why I’ve decided to organize the exhibition in an inland city such as Munich where the sea inhabits the space of ideas.”

CLAIR Gallery presented Munich Seaside from July 21 to August 31 2016 at Franz-Joseph-Strasse 10 in Munich.

Purchase Information: The featured image is Remi écoutant la mer by Édouard Boubat, 1995. Copyright Édouard Boubat, courtesy the CLAIR Gallery. Purchase inquiries are welcome via email at anna@clair.me