Friday, March 14, 2025

Alvin Langdon Coburn

Alvin Langdon Coburn
The Bridge, Ipswich
1904
photogravure
Phillips Collection, Washington DC


Alvin Langdon Coburn
Portrait of writer George Meredith
1904
photogravure
Phillips Collection, Washington DC
 
Alvin Langdon Coburn
The Embankment, London
ca. 1905
photogravure
Phillips Collection, Washington DC

Alvin Langdon Coburn
Regent's Canal, London
ca. 1905
photogravure
Phillips Collection, Washington DC

Alvin Langdon Coburn
Portrait of writer Edward Carpenter
1905
photogravure
Phillips Collection, Washington DC

Alvin Langdon Coburn
Portrait of writer Henry James
1906
photogravure
Phillips Collection, Washington DC

Alvin Langdon Coburn
Portrait of painter John Singer Sargent
1907
photogravure
Phillips Collection, Washington DC

Alvin Langdon Coburn
Portrait of writer and caricaturist Max Beerbohm
1908
photogravure
Phillips Collection, Washington DC

Alvin Langdon Coburn
Portrait of writer Hilaire Belloc
1908
photogravure
Phillips Collection, Washington DC

Alvin Langdon Coburn
Portrait of painter William Orpen
1908
photogravure
Phillips Collection, Washington DC

Alvin Langdon Coburn
Portrait of painter William Nicholson
1908
photogravure
Phillips Collection, Washington DC

Alvin Langdon Coburn
Portrait of writer John Galsworthy
1909
photogravure
Phillips Collection, Washington DC

Alvin Langdon Coburn
London - St Paul's from Ludgate Circus
1909
photogravure
Phillips Collection, Washington DC

Alvin Langdon Coburn
The British Lion (Trafalgar Square)
ca. 1910
photogravure
Phillips Collection, Washington DC

Alvin Langdon Coburn
Fifth Avenue from the St Regis, New York
ca. 1910
photogravure
Phillips Collection, Washington DC

Alvin Langdon Coburn
Portrait of poet Herbert Trench
1913
photogravure
Phillips Collection, Washington DC

Alvin Langdon Coburn
Portrait of painter and critic Roger Fry
1913
photogravure
Phillips Collection, Washington DC

from Midnight

Below the river sparkled. As I said,
everything glittered – the stars, the bridge lights, the important
illumined buildings that seemed to stop at the river
then resume again, man's work
interrupted by nature. From time to time I saw
the evening pleasure boats; because the night was warm, 
they were still full.

This was the great excursion of my childhood.
The short train ride culminating in a gala tea by the river,
then what my called our promenade,
then the boat itself that cruised back and forth over the dark water –

The coins in my aunt's hand passed into the hand of the captain.
I was handed my ticket, each time a fresh number.
Then the boat entered the current.

I held my brother's hand. 
We watched the monuments succeeding one another
always in the same order
so that we moved into the future
while experiencing perpetual recurrences.

The boat traveled up the river and then back again.
It moved through time and then
through a reversal of time, though our direction
was forward always, the prow continuously 
breaking a path in the water.

It was like a religious ceremony
in which the congregation stood
awaiting, beholding,
and that was the entire point, the beholding.

The city drifted by,
half on the right side, half on the left.

See how beautiful the city is,
my aunt would say to us. Because
it was lit up, I expect. Or perhaps because
someone had said so in the printed booklet.

– Louise Glück (2014)