Pilates Central » Joseph Pilates, Exercise Pioneer
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Joseph Pilates, Exercise Pioneer
‘Joseph Pilates, Exercise Pioneer’
An Exhibition Of Photographs
Now Receiving Its World Premiere
At Pilates Central
Many people are not aware that Pilates, the popular technique of
exercise and body-conditioning, takes its name from a person: Joseph
Pilates, the German-born emigré to Britain and
then America, who devised it as a new approach to exercise and
body-conditioning in the early decades of the last century.
A lot more people, however, now have the chance to learn of the fact,
thanks to exhibition of unique photographs of Joseph Pilates, shown at
work in the world’s first Pilates Studio.
‘Joseph Pilates, Exercise Pioneer’, is the name of the exhibition
showcasing photographs of Pilates, taken in 1961 by I.C. ‘Chuck’
Rapoport, a star photojournalist for Paris-Match (New York Bureau), The
Saturday Evening Post, LIFE, TIME, National Geographic and other
magazines in the 1960s heyday of photo-journalism.
Rapoport’s assignments for Paris Match alone included photographing JF
Kennedy, Marilyn Monroe, Elizabeth Taylor, Eva Gabor, Tina Onassis, the
Crown Prince and Princess of Japan, Fidel Castro, Samuel Beckett and
Francois Truffaut, and many more. His cover photo of Jackie Kennedy on
the now classic ‘JFK funeral issue’ of Paris Match was seen around the
world.
In October 1961, while still a young photographer, he was sent by Sports
Illustrated magazine to photograph Joseph Pilates, a German-born
inventor of a new form of exercise, then known as ‘Contrology’, but
nowadays known as ‘Pilates’. Rapoport photographed Pilates, then 80, in
his New York exercise studio located in a second-floor space on 8th
Avenue in New York.
The stylish black-and-white photographs of Joe Pilates taken by Rapoport
are, as far as is known, the only magazine-quality photographs of Joseph
Pilates ever taken, and the only ones still in existence.
The exhibition at Pilates Central comprises the first time that they
have been assembled for display in a single exhibition. The exhibition
has received not just national but international media attention.
It is, in fact, one of two exhibitions of Rapoport’s photographs taking
place in the UK this year. The National Library in Wales has been
staging ‘ABERFAN: The Days After’, a major exhibition of Rapoport’s
photographs from Aberfan, taken immediately after the disaster in 1966.
These photographs first appeared as 14 pages in LIFE magazine and then
in a major exhibition in New York in 1967.
As the picture magazines began to die out Rapoport switched to a new
career as a Hollywood screenwriter. He became an award-winning
screenwriter, mainly writing for television.
Now in his sixties, he lives in Pacific Palisades, California with his
wife, Mary. When he is not writing for television or working on his
autobiography, My Life as a Photojournalist, he studies Krav Maga
self-defence techniques four times a week.
‘Joseph Pilates, Exercise Pioneer’, runs at Pilates Central until further notice.
High-quality prints of these and other photographs from the exhibition, signed by I.C. Rapoport, are on sale to the public.
Pilates Central is at Colebrooke House 10-12 Gaskin Street, London N1 2RY.
Tel: 020 7288 8080 Email: islington@pilatescentral.co.uk
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