Thursday, November 30, 2023

Visual Relics (1926-1928)

Horst von Harbou
Crowd in Workers' City
(film production)
1926
gelatin silver print
Los Angeles County Museum of Art

Man Ray
Arnold Schoenberg
1927
gelatin silver print
Art Institute of Chicago

Eugene Robert Richee
Louise Brooks
1927
gelatin silver print
Los Angeles County Museum of Art

Elisabeth Hase
Self Portrait
ca. 1927
gelatin silver print
Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, Missouri

Albert Renger-Patzsch
Untitled
ca. 1927
gelatin silver print
Art Institute of Chicago

Albert Renger-Patzsch
Aegidienkirche, Lübeck
1927
gelatin silver print
Minneapolis Institute of Art

Albert Renger-Patzsch
Cyclamen
ca. 1927
gelatin silver print
Los Angeles County Museum of Art

Imogen Cunningham
Black and White Lilies III
ca. 1928
gelatin silver print
Cleveland Museum of Art

Karl Blossfeldt
Achillea Umbellata
ca. 1928
photogravure
Minneapolis Institute of Art

Karl Blossfeldt
Cornus Nuttallii and Cornus Florida
ca. 1928
photogravure
Minneapolis Institute of Art

Karl Blossfeldt
Saxifraga Willkommiana
ca. 1928
photogravure
Minneapolis Institute of Art

Walker Evans
Portrait of Paul Grotz
ca. 1928
gelatin silver print
Los Angeles County Museum of Art

Lotte Stam-Beese
Albert Braun with Mirror
ca. 1928
gelatin silver print
Minneapolis Institute of Art

Edward Steichen
Lupe Velez, Hollywood
1928
gelatin silver print
Minneapolis Institute of Art

Edward Steichen
Greta Garbo
1928
gelatin silver print
Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, Missouri

George Hoyningen Huene
Beachwear by Elsa Schiaparelli
(fashion shot for British Vogue)
1928
gelatin silver print
Victoria & Albert Museum, London

It Is a Living Coral

a trouble

archaically fettered
to produce

E Pluribus Unum an
island

in the sea a Capitol
surmounted

by Armed Liberty –
painting

sculpture straddled by
a dome

eight million pounds
in weight

iron plates constructed
to expand

and contract with
variations

of temperature
the folding

and unfolding of a lily.
And Congress

authorized and the 
Commission

was entrusted was
entrusted!

a sculptured group
Mars

in Roman mail placing
a wreath

of laurel on the brow
of Washington

Commerce Minerva
Thomas

Jefferson John Hancock
at

the table Mrs. Motte
presenting

Indian burning arrows 
to Generals

Marion and Lee to fire
her mansion

and dislodge the British –
this scaleless

jumble is superb

and accurate in its
expression

of the thing they 
would destroy –

Baptism of Poca-
hontas

with a little card
hanging

under it to tell
the persons

in the picture.

It climbs

it runs, it is Geo.
Shoup

of Idaho it wears
a beard

it fetches naked
Indian

women from a river
Trumbull

Varnum Henderson
Frances

Willard's corset is
absurd –

Banks White Columbus
stretched

in bed men felling trees

The Hon. Michael
C. Kerr

onetime Speaker of
the House

of Representatives
Perry

in a rowboat on Lake
Erie

changing ships the
dead

among the wreckage
sickly green

– William Carlos Williams (1924)

Wednesday, November 29, 2023

Visual Relics (1924-1926)

Anonymous French Photographer
Yves Tanguy, Paris
1924
gelatin silver print
Art Institute of Chicago

Man Ray
Kiki de Montparnasse
1924
gelatin silver print
Los Angeles County Museum of Art

Alfred Cheney Johnston
Ziegfeld Nude
ca. 1924
gelatin silver print
Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, Missouri

Alfred Cheney Johnston
Mrs Cornelius Vanderbilt (Grace Graham Wilson)
ca. 1925
gelatin silver print
Chrysler Museum of Art, Norfolk, Virginia

Eugène Atget
Saint-Cloud
1924
arrowroot print
Chrysler Museum of Art, Norfolk, Virginia

Eugène Atget
Rue du Figuier, Paris
1924
albumen print
Chrysler Museum of Art, Norfolk, Virginia

Eugène Atget
Staircase, Grand Trianon, Versailles
1925
albumen print
Princeton University Art Museum

Laure Albin-Guillot
Untitled
ca. 1925
fresson print
Art Institute of Chicago

Albert Renger-Patzsch
Beech
1925
gelatin silver print
Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, Missouri

Friedrich Adolf Paneth
Seated Woman Sewing
ca. 1925
autochrome
Victoria & Albert Museum, London

Numa Blanc & Cie
Thédée Slavinsky in Narcisse
(Ballets-Russes costume by Léon Bakst)
1925
gelatin silver print
Victoria & Albert Museum, London

Kalman Boronkay
Untitled
ca. 1925
gelatin silver print
Los Angeles County Museum of Art

Curtis Moffat
Composition
ca. 1925
photogram
Victoria & Albert Museum, London

Ruth Harriet Louise
Carmel Myers (silent film star)
ca. 1925
gelatin silver print
Los Angeles County Museum of Art

László Moholy-Nagy
Belle-Isle
1926
gelatin silver print
Princeton University Art Museum

László Moholy-Nagy
Self Portrait: Lighting Cigarette
1926
photogram
Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, Missouri

Variations on a Theme by William Carlos Williams

                                              1

I chopped down the house that you had been saving to live in next summer.
I am sorry, but it was morning, and I had nothing to do
and its wooden beams were so inviting.

                                              2

We laughed at the hollyhocks together
and then I sprayed them with lye.
Forgive me. I simply do not know what I am doing.

                                              3

I gave away the money that you had been saving to live on for the next ten years.
The man who asked for it was shabby
and the firm March wind on the porch was so juicy and cold.

                                              4

Last evening we went dancing and I broke your leg.
Forgive me. I was clumsy, and
I wanted you here in the wards, where I am the doctor! 

– Kenneth Koch (1962)

Tuesday, November 28, 2023

Visual Relics (1918-1924)

Jessie Tarbox Beals
Mrs Dwight K. Yerxa as Queen Isabella
in the Minneapolis pageant, Torchbearer

1918
gelatin silver print
Minneapolis Institute of Art

Jessie Tarbox Beals
Pageant of the Civic Players of Minneapolis
1918
gelatin silver print
Minneapolis Institute of Art

Daguerre Studio (Chicago)
Ruth Page in The Birthday of the Infanta
(ballet production, Chicago Opera Association)

1919
gelatin silver print
Victoria & Albert Museum, London

Paul Haviland
Suzanne Lalique (artist and designer)
ca. 1919
platinum print
Cleveland Museum of Art, Ohio

Man Ray
William Carlos Williams (physician and poet)
ca. 1920
gelatin silver print
Princeton University Art Museum

Alfred Cheney Johnston
Dolores and Helene Costello (silent screen stars)
ca. 1920
gelatin silver print
Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, Missouri

Arthur F. Kales
Model with Translucent Drapery
ca. 1920
bromoil print
Getty Museum, Los Angeles

Arthur F. Kales
Doris Humphrey (dancer and choreographer)
ca. 1920
gelatin silver print
Getty Museum, Los Angeles

Jacques-Henri Lartigue
Untitled
ca. 1920
gelatin silver print
Los Angeles County Museum of Art

Arthur Rice
Alla Nazimova (silent screen star)
ca. 1921
gelatin silver print
Los Angeles County Museum of Art

Laura Gilpin
Fishermen at Concarneau, France
1922
gelatin silver print
Los Angeles County Museum of Art

Edward Weston
Stanwood Badger (artist)
1923
gelatin silver print
Los Angeles County Museum of Art

Eugène Atget
Le Printemps by Philippe Magnier
(statue at Versailles)

1922
albumen print
Princeton University Art Museum

Eugène Atget
Venus by Pierre Legros the Elder
(statue at Versailles)
1923-24
gelatin silver chloride print
Princeton University Art Museum

Eugène Atget
Sleeping Ariadne, or Cleopatra,
after antique original at the Vatican
(statue at Versailles)

ca. 1923-24
gelatin silver print
Princeton University Art Museum

Eugène Atget
Hameau de la Reine, Versailles
ca. 1923-24
albumen print
Princeton University Art Museum

Sonnet in Search of an Author

Nude bodies like peeled logs
sometimes give off a sweetest
odor, man and woman

under the trees in full excess
matching the cushion of

aromatic pine-drift fallen
threaded with trailing woodbine
a sonnet might be made of it

Might be made of it! odor of excess
odor of pine needles, odor of
peeled logs, odor of no odor
other than trailing woodbine that

has no odor, odor of a nude woman
sometimes, odor of a man.

– William Carlos Williams (Pictures from Brueghel, 1962)

Joseph Petrocelli
Away from the Beaten Path - Venice
ca. 1923
bromoil print
Los Angeles County Museum of Art

Monday, November 27, 2023

Visual Relics (1910-1917)

Imogen Cunningham
Self Portrait
ca. 1910
platinum print
Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, Missouri

Karl Struss
Penn Station, New York
1910
platinum print
Los Angeles County Museum of Art

Heinrich Kühn
Still Life with Fruit
1910
photogravure
Art Institute of Chicago

Frank Eugene
Minuet
ca. 1910
photogravure
Minneapolis Institute of Art

Frank Eugene
Self Portrait on my Roof Garden
1911
autochrome
Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, Missouri

Paul Haviland
Luna Park at Night
ca. 1910
platinum print
Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, Missouri

Herbert G. Ponting
The Hut at Cape Evans, Antarctica
ca. 1911
gelatin silver print
Los Angeles County Museum of Art

E.J. Bellocq
Storyville Portrait, New Orleans
ca. 1911-13
modern gelatin silver print from glass-plate negative
Victoria & Albert Museum, London

E.J. Bellocq
Storyville Portrait, New Orleans
ca. 1911-13
modern gelatin silver print from glass-plate negative
Victoria & Albert Museum, London

E.J. Bellocq
Storyville Portrait, New Orleans
ca. 1911-13
modern gelatin silver print from glass-plate negative
Victoria & Albert Museum, London

"E.J. Bellocq took these photographs in Storyville, the notorious district of New Orleans where prostitution was legalised from 1897 to 1917. The only photographs attributed to Bellocq are images of prostitutes and their surroundings. They are remarkable for their relaxed portrayal of nudity. Bellocq's work became widely known when photographer Lee Friedlander bought his damaged glass negatives and made new prints from them. Friedlander's interpretation of this secret archive is now as much a part of the history of these photographs as the scant details known of Bellocq's life. Despite their 'discovery' and promotion, we still do not know why Bellocq made these curious images, and they have lost little of their mystery."

– from curator's notes at the Victoria & Albert Museum

Charles Gerschel
Tamara Karsavina in La Tragédie de Salomé
(Ballets Russes costume and set by Serge Sudeikin)
1913
gelatin silver print
Victoria & Albert Museum, London

Edward Steichen
Isadora Duncan
1913
photogravure
Minneapolis Institute of Art

F. Holland Day
Portrait of Maynard White
ca. 1915
platinum print
Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, Missouri

Guy Gayler Clark
St Patrick's Cathedral
ca. 1917
gelatin silver print
Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, Missouri

Frances Benjamin Johnston
Portrait of a Woman
ca. 1917
platinum print
Princeton University Art Museum

Heinrich Kühn
Roses
ca. 1910
gum bichromate print
Getty Museum, Los Angeles