THROUGH A MODERN LENS GROPIUS AND HIS PHOTOGRAPHER
by MATTHEW DAMORA As a child, Matthew Damora frequently assisted his father, Robert, on photographic assignments on location and in the darkroom. Since the death of the elder Damora in 2009, Matt has been restoring his father’s photographs and making them available for publication and exhibition.
It feels like an error in destiny that I never met Walter Gropius. When he died in 1969, I was thirteen years old. While my childhood memories are not as comprehensive or as vivid as those many claim to enjoy, I think I would recall an encounter with Gropius. Where the likeness of a deity might hang, a portrait of Gropius was prominently displayed in my parents’ home. In third grade, a teacher asked my sister the identity of her religion (a politically correct question then). My sister proclaimed, “Architecture.” In our secular home, Gropius was God. All photographs by Robert Damora © Damora Archive, all rights reserved.
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