PICTORIALIST AND
STRAIGHT
PHOTOGRAPHY
Alfred Stieglitz
Edward Steichen
Edward Weston
Paul Strand
Minor White
Alfred Stieglitz (1864-1946)
“In photography there is a reality so subtle that it becomes more real than reality.”
•Born in New Jersey, studied photography in Germany, then
lived and worked in New York City.
•Photographer, writer and editor, gallery owner, exhibit
organizer, and activist.
•Career spanned more than 50 years, bridging the 19th and
20th centuries, and receiving 150 medals.
•Key figure to achieve acceptance of photography as an art
form, and later “modern” art. The center of photographic
progress was shifted from Europe to America by his efforts.
•Produced the most famous of photographic magazines,
Camera Work, from 1903-17.
•Started the Photo-Secession group (1902-1917) and
Gallery 291, which promoted “Pictorialist” photographers
(printing and retouching achieved soft focus and painterly
effects) and served as a meeting place for photographers
and modern artists. Cézanne, Picasso and others had their
first American exhibitions here.
•His own photography was “straight and pure” (not
manipulated) and stressed formal (elements & design) and
metaphoric (story) qualities.
•Worked with Edward Steichen, and discovered Paul Strand.
•His marriage to artist Georgia O’Keeffe, who was 20 years
younger than him, was one of the great American love
stories, having a powerful synergistic effect on both their
work.
Georgia
O’Keeffe’s
Hands
(1920)
Georgia
O’Keeffe’s
Hands with
Thimble
(1920)
Hands of
Dorothy
Norman
Paula
(c.1900)
The Steerage
(1907)
“The Terminal” (1892)
Spring Showers
in New York
(1902)
From An
American
Place
Barn, Lake George
Mountain and
Sky, Lake
George
(c.1930)
Edward Steichen (1879-1973)
“Photography records the gamut of feelings written on the human face - the
beauty of the earth and skies that man has inherited; and the wealth and
confusion that man has created. It is a major force in explaining man to man.”
• Born in Luxembourg, came to the US when he was two.
• Began photography in 1895, but also continued as a
painter for 20 years.
• Early work was soft focus “pictorialism”. After WWI,
practiced “straight” photography.
• Subjects included portraits, landscape, fashion, and
advertising.
• Greatly impressed by the work of sculptor, Auguste Rodin.
•Helped Stieglitz open and run the “291” Galleries of the
Photo-Secession.
•Curator of Photography at the Museum of Modern Art for
15 years.
•His “The Family of Man” was the most popular exhibit in
the history of photography.
•One of the small group of individuals whose ideas, energy,
and images helped to shape photography in the 20th
century.
Greta Garbo
(1928)
Gloria Swanson
(1924)
Rodin’s Thinker
Balzac at Midnight (1908)
Rodin’s Balzac (1908)
The Flatiron
(1905)
The Triumph of
the Egg
(1921)
Maypole
(1932)
Matches and
Matchboxes
“Heavy Roses” (1914)
Lotus
(1915)
Edward Weston (1886-1958)
“To compose a subject well means no more than to see and present it in the
strongest manner possible.”
• Born in Illinois, raised in Chicago, and later moved to
California, Mexico City, then back to California.
• Attended Illinois College of Photography. Started as a
door-to-door portrait photographer, then had his own
portrait studio.
• In 1922, after meeting Alfred Stieglitz and Paul Strand in
New York City, his style turned toward semi-abstractions in
a precise hard-edged style.
• He called this style “Pre-visualization”. Working with a
large-format camera and available light, he concentrated on
revealing the subtleties of tone and the sculptural formal
design of a single object in its “deepest moment of
perception.”
•In 1932, he helped to found the f/64 group of purist
photographers, along with Ansel Adams, Imogen
Cunningham, and others.
•In the late 1940’s, Parkinson’s disease hampered his work.
From this point on, his sons, Brett and Cole, did the
supervised printing from his negatives.
•His legacy of several thousand carefully composed,
superbly printed, sensuously precise images have
influenced photographers around the world for over 50
years.
Pepper,
Number 30
(1930)
Shell
(1927)
Artichoke Halved (1930)
Driftwood
Zabriskie Point
Point Lobos
(1946)
White Dunes (1936)
Dunes Oceano (1936)
Nude (1925)
Nude
Nude
Nude
(1936)
Paul Strand (1890-1976)
“Your photography is a record of your living.”
•Born in New York City.
•Student of Lewis Hine, who introduced him to Alfred
Stieglitz and the Photo Secessionists in 1907.
•Became a close friend of Stieglitz and an advocate of
“straight” photography.
•His most popular works include direct street pictures
(some taken with a concealed camera) and formally
structured works, relying on shape, pattern, and repetition.
•Created motion picture films from World War I until 1943.
•In 1945, the Museum of Modern Art had its first full-scale
retrospective of a contemporary photographer with his
work. He also had major retrospective exhibits at the
Philadelphia Museum of Art, the Metropolitan Museum of
Art, and the Los Angeles County Museum in early 1970’s.
•Lived most of his later life in France because of a fear of
political persecution for his left-wing views in cold-war
obsessed America.
Wall Street (1915)
City Hall Park
(1915)
Untitled (1915)
Blind
(1916)
Church
(1944)
White Fence (1916)
Wire Wheel
Lathe,
Number 3
(1923)
Leaves II
(1929)
Minor White (1908-1976)
“Be still with yourself until the object of your attention affirms your presence. No
matter how slow the film, Spirit always stands still long enough for the
photographer It has chosen.”
•Born and raised in Minnesota, but also lived in Oregon,
New York, California, and Massachusetts.
•Influenced by psychology and Oriental philosophy, he
launched the notion of expressive photography and the
“reading of photographs.” One does not photograph
something for “what it is, but for what it is not.”
•Taught photography for 30 years (1946-1976) at the
California School of Fine Arts, R.I.T., and M.I.T., and was a
curator at the George Eastman House. He devoted himself
to bringing broad public recognition of photography as an
art form and teaching the public to appreciate these
images.
•Worked and became good friends with Alfred Stieglitz,
Edward Weston, Paul Strand, Ansel Adams, Dorothea
Lange, and other prominent photographers.
•Was a founder of Aperture magazine (still the leading
photographic periodical) and the Society for Photographic
Education.
•The most influential photographer and teacher of
photography in postwar United States.
Devil’s Slide (1947)
Warehouse (1949)
Capitol Reef
(1962)
Peeled Paint
(1959)
Snow on Garage Door (1960)
Vertical Surf
(1947)
Windowsill
Daydreaming
(1958)
Barn and Clouds (1955)
House
Road and Poplar Trees (1955)