Little known over here, the American photographer Emil Cadoo (1926-2002) was an active member of controversial literary communities in Fifites New York and Paris. Being black and gay and an “erotic” photographer, he sensibly chose the latter as his home.

In Cadoo’s first UK exhibition, his portraits of young men and women demonstrate a signature style of immersing subjects amongst layers of background textures meticulously chosen to connect with — or reflect — their characters.

Presenting the living against inanimate stone, wood, foliage or water creates an irresistibly romantic melancholy.

His distinctive technique demanded great skill with camera exposures and printing; today, of course, such productions are achieved digitally in minutes. His earliest experiments involved stone sculptures from Paris cemetries, faces now floating in eternity amongst water or leafy halos. But as this small collection reveals, Cadoo’s photographs of naked, living bodies are the most interesting and expressive.

The eye is drawn through the veils, to penetrate the rippling, crackled, shadowy textures — elegant women swim forever in these depths; entwined couples move in slow love-tangles, more sensual than erotic. In the mid-Sixties, these images graced the covers of novels like Henry Miller’s Sexus — though they lack the explicitness of the writing. Still, in puritan America, Cadoo’s erotic photo-essay for the magazine, “Evergreen Review”, was only saved from pulping by the eminent photographer Edward Steichen, who compared them with Rodin’s sculptures.

For many, Cadoo’s reputation is still based on his late portraits of Edith Piaf, the friend who described him as “a poet with a camera”.
Until 6 May. Information: 020 7930 5940 www.whitespacegallery.co.uk