Peter Hujar (1934–1987) photographed the world that existed in New York between the Stonewall uprising and the AIDS crisis: the downtown avant-garde, the queer community, urban ruins. He produced black-and-white images of startling clarity. Candy Darling dying in a hospital bed. Susan Sontag lying on her back, lost in thought. The wary gaze of David Wojnarowicz. Hujar was under-recognized during his lifetime, but since his death from AIDS-related pneumonia, in 1987, he’s become increasingly essential. Berlin’s Gropius Bau now pairs Hujar’s photographs with the work of Liz Deschenes, a New York artist whose sculptures and non-representational photographs strip the medium down to its barest properties—light, chemistry, time. —Elena Clavarino