The son of Russian-Jewish immigrants in America, Richard Avedon would ultimately become one of the great figures in the world of photography. Now, four years after his death at the age of 81, a grand retrospective of Avedon's work is on show in Berlin.

The exhibition titled "Richard Avedon -- Photos 1946-2004 -- A Retrospective" has arrived via Paris and after its stay in Berlin's Martin-Gropius-Bau through Jan. 19, it will move on to Amsterdam.

The Avedon Foundation, which has its seat in the Museum of Modern Art in New York, has chosen more than 250 stunning portraits and fashion shots from among the photographer's half-a-million negatives for the Berlin presentation.

The exhibition spans 30 years of his work -- from the early 1940s in Rome and Sicily to the street scenes in Paris immediately after the World War II to his iconic photographs of the glamorous fashion world of the 1950s in Paris and his later more psychological portraits of the literati, artists and entertainers.

As late as the mid-1970s, very few art museums had categorized photography as an "artistic" medium at al, but then came a turning point and contemporary photographic art gained a foothold in museum collections.

"Today, photography is recognized as an art form," said Norma Stevens, the director of the Avedon Foundation at the Berlin show's opening.

Avedon became a celebrity in his own right, initially through his early success in fashion photography. He worked for international magazines such as Harper's Bazaar, Vogue and The New Yorker where he became the first staff photographer.

Besides New York, he was especially well known in Paris as well as in Berlin where he was considered an icon in his field.

"At his first photographic exhibition in Paris, 200,000 people flocked to see it," said Stevens, in an interview with DPA.

One day in 1956, Avedon had climbed to the roof of the Paris Studio of Harper's Bazaar and, with the help of his French technician and printmaker, tore away the layers of tarpaper and plaster that covered the skylight of the magazine's atelier.

A generation of Bazaar's photographers, among them Baron de Meyer, George Hoyningen-Huene, and Louise Dahl-Wolfe had photographed Paris' beau monde in all its titled glory under artificial illumination in the confines of a blacked-out-studio.

But Avedon was after something different, capturing the radiant beauty of Suzy Parker -- resplendent in Dior -- photographed against a plain felt backdrop that gave the impression that Suzy had torn away the gown's tent-like cape from the scenery itself.

During his Paris sojourn Avedon did not work solely in the studio, as writer-associate Ken Coupland points out in notes on the Berlin show. "He famously photographed his troupe of models slumming in full regalia on the Left Bank in the louche surrounding's of the district's tacky pool halls, casinos and nightclubs," he said.

"In these studies of fictionalized and vaguely scandalous nightlife, Avedon's goddesses -- Suzy Parker, her sister Dorian Leigh, the coltish Barbara Mullen, the ravishing Dovima, the Goyesque China Machado, the dangerous-looking Carmen and even Audrey Hepburn, dressed like some improbable Faberge egg -- were almost invariably paired with several handsome young hunks."

The Berlin exhibition not only displays the Paris-end photos but also Avedon's magnificent portraits and studies of the "uncelebrated" in his extraordinary "American West" series -- among them waitresses, old field workers, ranch hands, truckers and carnies.

In the years of 1979 and 1984. Avedon and his team traveled through 17 of the western American states taking a total of 725 portraits, of which ultimately he chose 124 black-and-white photographs for his series.

"Avedon was interested in the people in the American West, sensing the workers were being ignored whereas in reality they were the backbone of the country," said Stevens. "In those photographs you see them as people. He was a great portraitist and that was his main interest."

Another highlight of the exhibition is Avedon's Brandenburg Gate and "Fall of the Wall," a set of atmospheric black-and white pictures.

When the Berlin Wall came down in November 1989, Berliners had been euphoric. But by New Year's Eve 1989, the elation had faded somewhat and the Berliners, especially those in East Berlin, were beginning to wonder about the future and whether they would lose their jobs.

Sensing the history of the occasion, Avedon flew to Berlin on New Year's Eve then, and with his camera he captured partygoers on a scaffolding that collapsed and watched as trouble-makers threw fireworks and bottles into the crowd.

On the Pariser Platz, Avedon captures a hardy young woman in black, swigging from a bottle, perched on a road sign, as fireworks explode in the night sky.

"Avedon showed the chaos and the fear and anxiety of the people," Stevens said. "That was what he saw -- he didn't expect to see that."

Later, Avedon would say of that night: "I was afraid. I sensed a climate of violence and danger."

DPA/Expatica