What you need to know
A new exhibition of photographs by Dennis Hopper has opened at the Royal Academy, London. Hopper, best-known as the late Hollywood actor who appeared in Easy Rider, Apocalypse Now, Blue Velvet and Speed, was also a photographer and artist throughout his acting career.
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What the critics like
This inspired exhibition shows Hopper in a markedly different light to his manic screen presence, defusing the darkness of his roles into images that are "sympathetic, sensitive and sensual", says Christian House in the Daily Telegraph. Exhibited at eye-level in one extended, celluloid-like strip, the modestly sized vintage prints invite the viewer to stop and peer in rather than move along.
"This superb show reveals his self-taught brilliance as a photographer," says Sue Steward in the Evening Standard. It mingles pictures of celebrities with photojournalistic scenes of everyday life and abstract images, which still seem so fresh and cool today.
"Exhibited in Britain for the first time, this belated debut marks Dennis Hopper's place in the history of photography," says Eleanor MacFarlane on The Upcoming. Hopper had an unerring sense of what makes a good composition leaving us with a great feel for his endless quest for creative freedom and expression.
What they don't like
Hopper's weirdness sometimes "thrust itself into the lens" in his creepy shots of dolls and mannequins, "a somehow unnatural extension of his all-American passion for airbrushed lovelies on billboards", says Jasper Rees on the Arts Desk. But he seems to have outgrown a young man's interest in persuading women to take their clothes off and, ultimately, this trip to the Sixties reveals a surprisingly humane Hopper.
Photo credit:
Dennis HopperAndy Warhol, Henry Geldzahler, David Hockney and Jeff Goodman, 1963Photograph, 17.25 x 24.74 cmThe Hopper Art Trust© Dennis Hopper, courtesy The Hopper Art Trust. www.dennishopper.com