Stephen Shore valuation

Stephen Shore (born 1947) was born in New York City and was largely self-taught, given a darkroom set at the age of six. From 1965, at seventeen, he spent about three years around Andy Warhol's Factory, photographing Warhol and the people around him, and in 1971 he became the first living photographer to have a solo exhibition at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. On road trips across the United States in the 1970s he photographed streets, motels, meals and town centres in colour, first with a 35mm camera and then with a large-format view camera using 8×10 film, work published as American Surfaces (1999) and Uncommon Places (1982). He took part in New Topographics in 1975, had a solo exhibition of colour photographs at the Museum of Modern Art in 1976, and has directed the photography department at Bard College since 1982.

What comes to market is mostly colour prints, with some black and white work from the Factory years. A buyer will want to know when a print was made, since prints from the 1970s are treated differently from later prints and editions, along with its size, edition and signature. Colour prints of that period can fade or shift in colour, so condition and storage matter, and prints should also be checked for creases and surface damage.