V&A South Kensington.
Closes Sunday 5th January.
 
There are lots of reviews online for this exhibition. I hadn’t read more than one or two before I went and was unprepared for the sheer scale of it.  Over 300, sometimes large, prints from 140 photographers.

A selection from the personal collection of Elton John and David Furnish but what a collection. It sets out, according to the description, “to explore the connection between strength and vulnerability inherent in the human condition.”
Many images by some of the most famous photographers of the era, including iconic images you may be familiar with but also encompassing details of everyday life of everyday people. From the 1950’s to the present day.

The curators have divided it into rooms
Fashion, Stars of Stage, Screen and Studio, Desire, Reportage, The American Scene, Fragile Beauty, Constructed Images, Towards Abstraction and Collecting Now–

Most of the images are black and white.
A notice at the start declares “Sketching and photography is encouraged”. I took photos to give a general idea, not to faithfully reproduce.

The fashion and fame pictures allow us a gentle introduction, a visual feast, where we can admire the art and artifice with the occasional hint of disappointment.
Beauty, humour and irony through a focus on the male form takes us through the Desire gallery.

From there we are led into reportage and hard hitting images of American civil rights protests, the AIDS crisis and 9/11 alongside images of everyday USA.
We dip down into images  fabulous and intimate at the same time of addiction and life’s underbelly before coming out to abstraction with light and colour and new life. Here it is easier to view photography as art with one of the final images of cherry blossoms coloured by AI.

 
What’s it all about? While is reflective of the era of the collectors lives, lived in America there is stunning and thought provoking imagery in every section and it engages the senses. I guess one of its strengths is that although much of the subject matter is dark maybe there is enough beauty to give us hope.
It’s well worth a visit. I’ll let Elton John have the last word.
 
“I love painters, I love artwork, I collect paintings, but for me nothing speaks the truth more like a photograph – and David Hockney would kill me for saying that but I’m sorry, I’m right.”
 
Michele Summers