Art

When Harry Thuillier Jr was discovered dead in the labyrinthine spaces beneath Milan's central railway station in December 1997, aged only 33, it was a personal tragedy for his family and marked the premature end to a highly promising photographic career. Not that Thuillier Jr ever thought in terms of a career - he was more interested in developing a distinctive personal vision. His pictures have a melancholy, other-worldly air, not least because he embraced the exacting and expensive art of platinum printing, which allows the exploitation of unique surface textures and was perfectly suited to his dreamy, nocturnal imagination. Thuillier - A Retrospective Exhibition 1964-1997, at the Gallery of Photography, provides a welcome opportunity to survey a representative selection of his life's work. Pictured above is Thullier's Hand With Opium Pods.