100 Great American Photographs at the Amon Carter Museum

Friday, 14 July 2006 10:04

Fort Worth, TX - One hundred of the greatest photographs from one of the premier photography collections in the country will be on view at the Amon Carter Museum in Fort Worth, Texas, through August 20.  Presented in the 4,600-square-foot Special Exhibition Galleries, all of the works are from the museum’s permanent holdings; admission is free.

“This show presents some of the most artful, dramatic and inspiring works in the history of photograph,” said John Rohrbach, senior curator of photographs.  “With the quality and depth of the Carter’s collection, it was difficult to narrow the selection to 100, but we wanted to take advantage of the opportunity to showcase highlights of the collection in the museum’s prime gallery space.”

The exhibition covers the full history of photography, ranging from one of the earliest daguerreotypes created to an ink-jet print made last year, revealing a medium that has never ceased to evolve.  Major photographic movements emerge in the exhibition, and the photographers included are among the most recognized names in American art.  Important events in American history of the past 165 years unfold as well.  A bearded California Forty-Niner poses in a daguerreotypist’s studio around 1850. President Abraham Lincoln stands among his commanders on the fields of Antietam in 1862.  The aged Apache chief Geronimo sits for a photographer in 1898.  A youthful John F. Kennedy and his wife ride atop the backseat of their open-air limousine while campaigning in Boston.

“The photography collection at the Amon Carter Museum is a jewel of connoisseurship and a national treasure,” said Alison Nordström, curator of photographs at the George Eastman House International Museum of Photography and Film.  “Their ‘100 great photographs’ are sure to be a spectacular offering.”

Photography has been an integral part of the Carter’s collection and program for almost all of its 45-year history. Soon after the museum opened in January 1961 to display Amon G. Carter’s collection of works by Frederic Remington and Charles M. Russell, founding director Mitchell A. Wilder (1913–1979) began to include photography in his expansive and imaginative plans for the museum.  Wilder enthusiastically acquired a selection of her studies, and the cornerstone of the photography collection was formed.

During the ensuing years, the Carter’s photography collection developed the dual character of being an extensive historical archive documenting American cultural history as well as a fine art collection representing some of the greatest American achievements in photographic art.  In the exhibition 100 Great American Photographs, visitors will experience some of the highlights of this collection, now recognized as one of the most important in the country.

The museum’s continued commitment to its photography collection is mirrored in its frequent presentation of special exhibitions—both traveling shows and those organized by the Carter.  Recent examples include In the American West: Photographs by Richard Avedon; Master Prints of Edward S. Curtis: Portraits of Native America; Brent Phelps: Photographing the Lewis and Clark Trail; Eliot Porter: The Color of Wildness; and Edward Weston: Life Work.  This fall, the museum presents two special photography exhibitions: Bound for Glory, September 2 – November 12, organized by the Library of Congress, and Regarding the Land: Robert Glenn Ketchum and the Legacy of Eliot Porter, September 16, 2006 – January 7, 2007, organized by the Amon Carter Museum.

About the Amon Carter Museum’s Photography Collection

Although Amon G. Carter (1879–1955) did not collect photography, his renowned collection of paintings and sculptures by Frederic Remington and Charles M. Russell, the two leading artists of the American West, laid the groundwork for what would become one of the nation’s preeminent collections of American photography.  While he did not live to see its completion, Carter initiated plans for a museum for the city of Fort Worth; his collections would become the core of the Amon Carter Museum’s holdings of American art.  Shortly after the museum opened in 1961, photographer Dorothea Lange approached the museum about photographs of Charles Russell she had made in the mid-1920s when he visited her first husband, western painter Maynard Dixon.  Since the museum’s collection contained so many works by Russell, Lange wondered if the museum would be interested in having prints of the photographs.  Mitchell A. Wilder, the museum’s first director, acquired a selection of her studies, which became the first photographs in the museum’s collection.

During the last two decades, Carter curators have followed their predecessors’ examples and continued to acquire masterpieces that span the history of photography in America, from the medium’s first appearance in this country in 1840 to the present day.

Visit the Amon Carter Museum at : http://www.cartermuseum.org/