Helen Levitt (1913–2009) numbers among the foremost exponents of street photography. As a passionate observer and chronicler of everyday street life in New York, she spent decades documenting residents of the city’s poorer neighbourhoods such as East Harlem.

Levitt’s oeuvre stands out for her sense of dynamics and surrealistic sense of humour, and her employment of colour photography was revolutionary: Levitt numbers among those photographers who pioneered and established colour as a means of artistic expression.

The Albertina Museum is featuring this American photographer in a retrospective that brings together around 130 of her iconic works. Many of these photos come from Levitt’s personal estate, and this exhibition represents their first-ever public showing.