Edward Quinn, or “Ted” as his family called him, was born 1920 in Ireland. Starting in the 1950s, he lived and worked as a photographer on the Côte d’Azur, which was a playground for celebrities from the world of show biz, art and business during the “Golden Fifties”. The rich and famous came to the Riviera to relax. But the movie stars recognized the importance of their off-screen image, and Quinn was in the right place at the right time, managing to capture spontaneous and enchanting images that documented the charm, sophistication and chic of a legendary era.
In 1951, Edward Quinn met and photographed Pablo Picasso for the first time. Their friendship lasted until Picasso’s death in 1973. This encounter with Picasso had a lasting influence on Quinn, both personally and in regard to his subsequent work. Quinn is the author of several books and films about Picasso.
Starting in the 1960s, Quinn concentrated his professional activities on artists, photographing such figures as Max Ernst, Alexander Calder, Francis Bacon, Salvador Dalí, Graham Sutherland and David Hockney. In the late 1980s, a close relationship – similar to his friendship with Picasso – developed between Quinn and Georg Baselitz.
From 1992 until his death in 1997, Edward Quinn lived in Altendorf near Zurich with his Swiss wife Gret. She passed away in 2011.
There was a special exhibion of the Quinn photographs he made of Pablo PIcasso at the Quadrat Museum in Bottrop. The exhibition poster is available at www.ftn-books.com
