CLEVELAND MUSEUM OF ART PRESENTS " ICONS OF AMERICAN PHOTOGRAPHY "

Written by Wayne Rocco Sunday, 17 January 2010 20:19

CLEVELAND, OHIO - The Cleveland Museum of Art (CMA) announced the opening of Icons of American Photography: A Century of Photographs from The Cleveland Museum of Art (June 24-Sept. 16, 2007), a landmark exhibition of 117 iconic photographic works covering the period from 1850 to 1960 from CMA’s renowned permanent collection. The show will be on view in CMA’s galleries, 11150 East Blvd. in University Circle. Admission to the exhibition is free; however, tickets are required. According to Curator of Photography Tom Hinson, “CMA’s photography collection has been built over time, always emphasizing quality over quantity. Therefore, in this exhibition we are able to see how this revolutionary invention was so instinctively and imaginatively used to create an enduring legacy of artistic triumph while recording the development of a nation.”

American Icons includes remarkable photographic images by every major American photographer, from the early days of the Daguerreotype to images of America seen through the eyes of contemporary masters. Artists represented in the exhibition include: Ansel Adams (1902-1984); Margaret Bourke-White (1904-1971); Imogen Cunningham (1883-1976); Robert Frank (b. Switzerland, 1924); Dorothea Lange (1895- 1965); Gordon Parks (1912-2006); Charles Sheeler (1883-1965); Aaron Siskind (1829-1916); Edward Steichen (1879-1973); Alfred Steiglitz (1864-1946); Paul Strand (1890-1976); James VanDerZee (1886-1983); Walker Evans (1903-1975); Carleton Watkins (1829-1916); Weegee (b. Arthur Felig, 1899-1968); and Edward Weston (1866-1958). Hinson added that “in this exhibition, we have a visual record of America: who we were and who we have become.”

Exhibition Traces Development of American Culture

Icons of American Photography presents a remarkable summary of the evolving America. From the earliest days of photography, visitors will see a proliferation of portraiture, intimately personal and honest in composition. Works such as Artist with His Palette and Brushes (c. 1850s) by an unidentified 19th century photographer and Prosper M. Wetmore (1857) by Civil War-era photographer Mathew Brady (1823-1896) celebrate this tradition, which continues throughout the century with works such as Paul Robeson as “The Emperor Jones” (1933) by Edward Steichen (1879-1973) and Coney Island Bather (1939-1941) by Lisette Model (1901-1983).

During the late 19 th century, the U.S. Congress commissioned photographers to cover the American West. Photographs by Timothy O’Sullivan (1840-1882) and William Henry Jackson (1843-1942) are the most celebrated from among this era. This exhibition includes O’Sullivan’s East Humbolt Mountains, Utah (1868) and Jackson’s Mystic Lake, M.T. (1872). Icons also includes additional landscape photography documenting America’s enchantment with the Western frontier: Bridal Veil, Yosemite (c. 1856-66) by Carleton Watkins (1829-1916); Looking South Into the Grand Canyon, Colorado River, Sheavwitz (1872) by William H. Bell (1830-1910); and Hell’s Half Acre, Prismatic Springs (c. late 1880s) by Frank Jay Haynes (1853-1921).

In Icons, we also see the juxtaposition of rural America, evidenced in works such as Dust Storm, Cimarron County (1936) by Arthur Rothenstein (1915-1985) and Resident, Conway, Arkansas (1938) by Dorothea Lange (1895-1965), and a bustling, urban America, seen in works such as New York, the Elevated and Me (1936) by Ilse Bing (1899-1998); From My Window at the Shelton, West (1932) by Alfred Stieglitz (1864-19460; and New Orleans, Canal Street (1955) by Robert Frank (b. 1924). Similarly, Icons captures the emergence of industrial American in works such as Lathe, Akeley Shop, New York (1923) by Paul Strand (1890-1976) and San Francisco Waterfront, The General Strike (1933) by Dorothea Lange (1895-1965). The exhibition also shares glimpses into the commercialization of America, with photographs such as Window Display, Bethlehem, Pennsylvania (1935) by Evans Walker (1903-1975) and Always Camels, 1922 (1922) by Ralph Steiner (1899-1986).

Besides this documentary approach, the show also includes landmark photographs illustrating other major stylistic trends. The soft-focus, atmospheric qualities of pictorialism are apparent in Julia Hall McCune (c. 1897) by Clarence H. White (1871-1925) and Rodin-The Thinker (1902) by Edward Steichen. These dream-like works are contrasted by the sharply focused and distinctly printed modernist compositions emphasizing geometric forms in Black and White Lillies III (c. 1928) by Imogen Cunningham (1883-1976) and in Dunes, Oceana (1936) by Edward Weston (1886-1958.) Chicago 22 (1949) by Aaron Siskind (1903-1991) and Alley, Chicago (1948) by Harry Callahan (1912-1999) illustrate how ordinary observable reality was transformed into abstract compositions.

Exhibition Traces Development of Medium

Icons of American Photography provides a thorough survey of the photographic medium, from the earliest days of the Daguerreotype, albumen and salted paper prints of the mid to late 19 th century, to platinum and gelatin silver prints of the early 20 th century.

Revealed to the world by Frenchman Louis Daguerre in 1839, the Daguerreotype was the first practical photographic technique in which images were formed on a cooper plate covered with highly polished silver, coated with silver iodide and developed with vapor from heated mercury. Photographs such as Medallion Portrait of a Woman (c. 1850) by Josiah Johnson Hawes (1808-1901) and Albert Sands Southworth (1811-1894), The Music Teacher and His Wife (c. 1850) by an unidentified 19th century photographer and Dead Child on a Sofa (c. 1855), also by an unidentified 19th century photographer, highlight not only the use of the Daguerreotype by American photographers, but also early artists’ fascination with portraiture as well as a growing demand by the general public for likenesses of family and friends.

By the mid 1850s, photographic resolution and the ability to reproduce photographs was enhanced through the use of wet plate collodion photography, in which a mixture of nitrated cotton dissolved in ether, alcohol and other chemicals were poured onto a sheet of glass. This challenging technique required a darkroom always to be near by so that the collodion plate could be prepared, exposed and developed promptly while still moist. The inconvenience was offset by the clarity, often large scale and reproducibility of the process favored by American photographers for some three decades. Portraits including Mrs. John R. Johnston (before 1857) by John R. Johnston (1820-1872) and landscape photography such as Yosemite Valley from Mariposa Trail (c. 1865) by Charles L. Weed (1824-1903) and Valley of Yosemite from Rocky Ford (1872) by Eadweard Muybridge (1830-1904) document the use of this technique.

The platinum printing process, which depended on the light sensitivity of iron salts applied to a platinum compound to create an image, was invented in 1873 by William Willis. This technique was desired because of its capacity to produce a range of tones, typically silvery gray, and the increased permanence of resulting prints. Works documenting the use of this process include: The Crowell Children at Avondale (1885-1890) by Thomas Eakins (1844-1916); Untitled (Winter Landscape) (c. 1900) by William B. Post (1857-1921); Grand Canyon (1911) by Alvin Langdon Coburn (1882-1966); and Riverside Drive and 83rd Street, New York (1914) by Paul Strand (1890-1976). Although popular, the use of this process diminished during the 1920s when the price of platinum became too expensive for routine use by most photographers.

Gelatin silver prints, the most common means of making black and white photographs from negatives, were introduced in the late 1880s, replacing albumen prints, popular in the 1850s to 1880s. Much of the work in the exhibition was produced using this technique, including such stellar examples as Terminal Tower (1928) by Margaret Bourke-White (1904-1971); New York City (1928-29) by Evans Walker (1903-1975); Fashion Photograph Ad for Coty Lipstick (1935) by Edward Steichen (1879-1973); Moonrise, Hernandez, New Mexico (1941) by Ansel Adams (1902-1958); Young Gang Leader, Harlem (1948) by Gordon Parks (1912-2006); and Devil Goggles (1955-56) by W. Eugene Smith (1918-1978).

This exhibition is supported in part by an award from the National Endowment for the Arts. The Cleveland Museum of Art also receives support from the Ohio Arts Council, which helped fund this exhibition with state tax dollars to encourage economic growth, educational excellence, and cultural enrichment for all Ohioans.

Actively built since the 1980s, The Cleveland Museum of Art’s photography collection is a cohesive, carefully selected collection, chronicling the medium’s fine art history, highlighting major movements and important figures. Emphasis is placed on artistic achievement built by a variety of individual visions, ingenuity of technical solutions and superior physical condition. The evolution of photography from a scientific curiosity in the 1840s and 1850s to one of the most potent forms of artistic expression in the 20th century is particularly well represented in the Museum’s American photographs, distinguished by their chronological breadth, iconic imagery and stunning physical condition.

The Cleveland Museum of Art receives operating support from the Ohio Arts Council made available through state tax dollars to encourage economic growth, educational excellence and cultural enrichment for all Ohioans.

The Cleveland Museum of Art is one of America’s leading comprehensive museums. Its permanent collection is world renowned for its quality and breadth, spanning 6,000 years. The Museum is a significant international forum for exhibitions, scholarship and art acquisitions. For more information on the Museum, its holdings, programs, services and events, call 1-888-CMA-0033 or visit www.ClevelandArt.org .