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Alex Webb

Alex Webb is regarded as one of the most influential color photographers of our time. His distinctive use of color, light, and space has had a lasting impact on documentary photography. Webb's images are characterized by dramatic light, layered compositions, and the atmospheric intensity of tropical environments. Traveling through urban landscapes around the world, he focuses not only on everyday life but also on those fleeting, often enigmatic moments in which poetry, tension, and social reality converge. His photographs speak of movement, proximity, and observation—complex, vibrant, and charged with visual energy. All works featured in the exhibition were created using Leica M cameras.

“For more than three decades, Alex Webb has evoked not only the physical heat of sun-drenched places; his photographs also imbue them with a metaphysical warmth—an atmosphere of charged energy, filled with latent movement that could erupt into action at any moment. The visual spectacle he creates is at once intoxicating and meticulously composed.”

Alex Webb is regarded as one of the most influential color photographers of our time. His distinctive use of color, light, and space has had a lasting impact on documentary photography. Webb's images are characterized by dramatic light, layered compositions, and the atmospheric intensity of tropical environments. Traveling through urban landscapes around the world, he focuses not only on everyday life but also on those fleeting, often enigmatic moments in which poetry, tension, and social reality converge. His photographs speak of movement, proximity, and observation—complex, vibrant, and charged with visual energy. All works featured in the exhibition were created using Leica M cameras.

“For more than three decades, Alex Webb has evoked not only the physical heat of sun-drenched places; his photographs also imbue them with a metaphysical warmth—an atmosphere of charged energy, filled with latent movement that could erupt into action at any moment. The visual spectacle he creates is at once intoxicating and meticulously composed.”

— Max Kozloff, American art historian

Alex Webb was born on May 5, 1952, in San Francisco. He developed a passion for photography at an early age. From 1970 to 1974, he studied literature and history at Harvard University and, beginning in 1972, also received photographic training at the Apeiron Workshops in New York. After initially working in black and white, Webb later turned to color photography, publishing his photo essays in leading international magazines. Since 1979, he has been a full member of Magnum Photos.

His work has been exhibited internationally at museums and institutions including the Whitney Museum of American Art, the High Museum of Art, and the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. Alex Webb's photographs are held in the collections of, among others, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, and the Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego.

Webb has received numerous awards for his work, including the Leica Medal of Excellence (2000), the David Octavius Hill Medal of the German Academy of Photography (2002), and a Guggenheim Fellowship (2007). He is the author of more than fifteen books, including The Suffering of Light, a comprehensive retrospective of his color photography. His most recent publications include La Calle: Photographs from Mexico, Dislocations, and the collaborative books Brooklyn: The City Within and Waves, created with Rebecca Norris Webb. In autumn 2026, Aperture will publish his new book, Walking Blues, devoted to cities across the United States.

Ort: Leica Gallery Salzburg, Gaisbergstraße 12, 5020 Salzburg
Datum: 24th of July – 31st of August 2026
Opening: Thursday, 23rd of July 2026, 6:30 pm

Opening hours:
Tuesday - Friday: 14:00 – 18:00
Saturday: 10:00 – 14:00

Admission is free!