The man who brought Cubism to New York

The American Jewish artist Max Weber (1881–1961) was born in Belostok in Russia (now Bialystok in Poland), and although he visited this country twice (he came to London in 1906 and 1908), it was the experience of continental Europe — and particularly Paris — that was crucial for his development. The title of this exhibition is thus rather misleading: Weber never lived in England, and his ‘presence’ here is based upon a collection of his work made by his friend Alvin Langdon Coburn. Coburn (1882–1966), a boldly experimental photographer attached to the Vorticist group, was another American, but one who opted to settle in England in 1912. Weber and Coburn probably met in New York in 1910, two years later exploring the skyscrapers of the capital together, which became for both men a fruitful subject. Although Weber is not much known in this country, in America he has long been recognised as the man who brought Cubism to the States.