David Zwirner Gallery is pleased to present The Last Dyes, an exhibition of William Eggleston‘s final dye-transfer prints, at the gallery’s 606 N Western Avenue space in Los Angeles. The show features works from Eggleston’s acclaimed Outlands and Chromes series, alongside select images first exhibited in his groundbreaking 1976 show at the Museum of Modern Art, New York, and the accompanying publication William Eggleston’s Guide.
This marks the last major group of photographs ever created using the dye-transfer process. Eggleston, collaborating with his sons William and Winston, curated this selection as a representative overview of his photographic explorations from 1969 to 1974, which spanned the American South and West. In 1972, Eggleston embraced the dye-transfer method, drawn to its ability to produce exceptionally rich tones and vibrant colors.
Originally developed by Kodak in the 1940s for commercial and fashion photography, the dye-transfer process involves creating three separation negatives from the original image—Eggleston primarily used Kodachrome slides. These negatives are enlarged onto film matrices, each coated with a light-sensitive emulsion. Immersed in cyan, magenta, and yellow dyes, the matrices retain their respective hues and are pressed sequentially onto specially coated fiber paper, resulting in the final print.
By the early 1990s, Kodak ceased production of the materials required for the technique. Eggleston, along with master printers Guy Stricherz and Irene Malli, secured the remaining supplies to produce these final works, showcasing the deep connection between artist and medium.
The images in The Last Dyes reflect Eggleston’s unparalleled ability to capture color and light. In his landscapes, vast Southern skies dominate, juxtaposed with weathered structures and verdant fields. Road signs and cars punctuate the scenes, their vibrant hues standing out against skies in shifting tones of dawn, day, and dusk. Figures in his compositions not only enhance the color palette but also embody the time and place where Eggleston encountered them.
Interiors in the exhibition contrast light and shadow with a dramatic, almost baroque intensity. One striking self-portrait depicts Eggleston reclining in a dimly lit room, his head resting on a bright white pillow resembling sculpted marble. The interplay of soft light and deep shadow imbues the scene with a serene, almost sacred atmosphere, suggesting the transience of the moment and the intimacy of its setting.
Combining formal elegance with evocative glimpses of ordinary life, these dye-transfer prints remain as vivid and resonant today as the moments Eggleston captured half a century ago.

About the Author

For nearly six decades, William Eggleston (b. 1939) has crafted a unique visual language that seamlessly blends everyday subject matter with a refined understanding of color, form, and composition. His photographs elevate the mundane into evocative, poetic imagery that resists definitive interpretation. Eggleston’s groundbreaking 1976 solo exhibition at The Museum of Modern Art in New York, curated by John Szarkowski, was among the first showcases of color photography at the institution. Initially met with skepticism for its unconventional approach, the exhibition and its accompanying book, William Eggleston’s Guide, marked a pivotal moment in the acceptance of color photography as an art form, securing Eggleston’s place as a leading figure in the medium. His influence continues to shape contemporary visual culture.
Born in Memphis, Tennessee, Eggleston grew up in Sumner, Mississippi, and studied at Vanderbilt University in Nashville, Delta State College in Cleveland, Mississippi, and the University of Mississippi in Oxford. He joined David Zwirner gallery in 2016, where his inaugural solo exhibition, William Eggleston: The Democratic Forest, showcased selections from his expansive photographic series. Subsequent exhibitions include William Eggleston: 2 1/4 at David Zwirner London in 2019 and his first solo show in Greater China at the gallery’s Hong Kong space in 2020. In 2021, the two-artist exhibition William Eggleston and John McCracken: True Stories was held in New York, followed by William Eggleston: The Outlands at the 19th Street location in 2022. Currently, William Eggleston: The Last Dyes is on display at David Zwirner Los Angeles.
Since the 1970s, Eggleston’s photographs have been featured in solo exhibitions at leading institutions worldwide. Highlights include the Corcoran Gallery of Art in Washington, DC (1990); the Barbican Gallery in London (1992, traveling to several European museums); documenta IX in Kassel, Germany (2002); and Museum Ludwig in Cologne (2003, with subsequent venues across Europe and the U.S.). In 2008, a comprehensive retrospective, William Eggleston: Democratic Camera, Photographs and Videos 1961–2008, was co-organized by the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York and Haus der Kunst in Munich, later traveling to numerous institutions, including the Art Institute of Chicago and the Los Angeles County Museum of Art.
More recently, in 2023, a significant retrospective opened at C/O Berlin before traveling to Fundación MAPFRE in Barcelona. Other notable exhibitions include those at Fondation Cartier pour l’art contemporain in Paris (2009, later touring Tokyo and Gothenburg); The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York (2013 and 2018); and Foam Fotografiemuseum in Amsterdam (2017).
Eggleston has received numerous accolades, including a National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship (1975), the International Center of Photography Infinity Award for Lifetime Achievement (2004), and the Chevalier de l’Ordre des Arts et des Lettres from France (2016). In 2016, the Aperture Foundation honored him for his contributions to photography. His work is housed in major museum collections worldwide.
Established in 1992, the Eggleston Artistic Trust oversees the preservation and representation of the artist’s work under the direction of his sons, Winston Eggleston and William Eggleston III. In 2019, the Eggleston Art Foundation was founded in Memphis, Tennessee, to promote the study and conservation of his legacy. The foundation maintains the Eggleston Archive and serves as a research hub for scholars and enthusiasts alike.

William Eggleston: The Last Dyes
Until February 1, 2025
David Zwirner Gallery – Los Angeles – USA

More info:
https://www.davidzwirner.com/
https://egglestonartfoundation.org/