Brassaï’s Secret Paris Opens at Howard Greenberg Gallery in New York

A new exhibition at Howard Greenberg Gallery presents nearly 40 photographs from Brassaï’s celebrated Paris by Night series alongside selections from The Secret Paris, a group of images originally withheld from publication due to their provocative subject matter. 

Photographer Brassaï (born Gyula Halász in Brassó, Transylvania) published his Paris by Night in 1933, a groundbreaking photobook depicting the shadowed streets, cafés, lovers, and nocturnal wanderers that came to define the modern image of the city.

Brassaï’s photographs were considered too risqué for inclusion in the 1933 book The Secret Paris depicting the city’s underworld of brothels, bars, and illicit encounters, and they were not published until 1976.

The show coincides with a new edition of Brassaï’s 1933 book Paris by Night published by Flammarion, and an exhibition of his photography at the Moderna Museet, Stockholm, opening next month.

One most influential and poetic photographers of the 20th century, Brassaï (1899-1984) arrived in Paris in 1924 and worked as a journalist by day, photographing in bars, bistros, and brothels at night. His friend the writer Henry Miller who accompanied him on his nocturnal walks called him “the eye of Paris”.

Brassaï worked as a freelance photographer and writer for publications including Minotaure, Verve, Coronet, Picture Post, and Harper's Bazaar. Through the late 1960s, he continued working with Harper's Bazaar, traveling extensively on assignment. Many of his photographs made in England, Spain, the United States, and Brazil were printed in various publications during his lifetime.

Brassaï’s Secret Paris will be on view through March 28, 2026. The exhibition is jointly presented by Howard Greenberg Gallery and Grob Gallery, Geneva.