Lot 176: WALTER CHAPPELL

WALTER CHAPPELL 1925-2000 SELECTED IMAGES a group of 3 unique Polaroid Type 55 prints, comprising Cut Cabbage , Forks , and Abstraction , the first signed, dated, and annotated, the others with credit and date, in pencil, on the reverse, 1962 ( Heliography , p. 13, variant) (3) 3 1/2 by 4 1/2 in. (8.9 by 11.4 cm.) or the reverse

Walter Chappell trained as a photographer under Minor White and became part of a circle of noted artists that included White, Ansel Adams, Paul Caponigro, Imogen Cunningham, and Edward Weston. Together with White, Chappell often contributed articles to Aperture magazine on the mystical meaning behind photographs. Their beliefs were heavily influenced by the writings of noted spiritual philosopher G. I. Gurdjieff.

While curator of exhibitions and prints at the George Eastman House, Chappell helped establish the short-lived photographers' cooperative, Association of Heliographers Archive Gallery. In 1963, the Heliographers, named after Niépce's 1829 sun-print invention, opened on Lexington Avenue in Manhattan, and was the only gallery at that time devoted to creative photography in America.