Exhibition: ‘Unseen: 35 Years of Collecting Photographs’ at the J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles

Exhibition dates: 17th December 2019 – 8th March 2020

 

Weegee (Arthur Fellig) (American, born Austria, 1899-1968) '[Calypso]' about 1944; before 1946

 

Weegee (Arthur Fellig) (American born Austria, 1899-1968)
[Calypso]
about 1944; before 1946
Gelatin silver print
26.2 x 33.3cm (10 5/16 x 13 1/8 in.)
The J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles
© International Center of Photography

 

 

Imagine having these photographs in your collection!

My particular favourite is Hiromu Kira’s The Thinker (about 1930). For me it sums up our singular 1 thoughtful 2 imaginative 3 ephemeral 4 ether/real 5 existence.

“Aether is the fifth element in the series of classical elements thought to make up our experience of the universe… Although the Aether goes by as many names as there are cultures that have referenced it, the general meaning always transcends and includes the same four “material” elements [earth, air, water, fire]. It is sometimes more generally translated simply as “Spirit” when referring to an incorporeal living force behind all things. In Japanese, it is considered to be the void through which all other elements come into existence.” (Adam Amorastreya. “The End of the Aether,” on the Resonance website Feb 16, 2015 [Online] Cited 23/02/2020)

Dr Marcus Bunyan


Many thankx to the J. Paul Getty Museum for allowing me to publish the photographs in the posting. Please click on the photographs for a larger version of the image.

 

 

Carleton Watkins (American, 1829-1916) '[Guadalupe Mill]' 1860

 

Carleton Watkins (American, 1829-1916)
[Guadalupe Mill]
1860
Salted paper print
Image (dome-topped): 33.8 × 41.6cm (13 5/16 × 16 3/8 in.)
The J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles

 

Martin Munkácsi (American, born Hungary, 1896-1963) 'The Goalie Gets There a Split Second Too Late' about 1923

 

Martin Munkácsi (American born Hungary, 1896-1963)
The Goalie Gets There a Split Second Too Late
about 1923
Gelatin silver print
29.8 × 36.7cm (11 3/4 × 14 7/16 in.)
The J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles
© Estate of Martin Munkácsi, Courtesy Howard Greenberg Gallery, New York

 

Hiromu Kira (American, 1898-1991) 'The Thinker' about 1930

 

Hiromu Kira (American, 1898-1991)
The Thinker
about 1930
Gelatin silver print
27.9 × 35.1cm (11 × 13 13/16 in.)
The J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles
© Sadamura Family Trust

 

Hiromu Kira (1898-1991) was one of the most successful and well-known Japanese American photographers in prewar Los Angeles. He was born in Waipahu, O’ahu, Hawai’i on April 5, 1898, but was sent to Kumamoto, Japan, for his early education. When he was eighteen years old, he returned to the United States and settled in Seattle, Washington, where he first became interested in photography. In 1923, he submitted prints to the Seattle Photography Salon which accepted two of the photographs. In 1923, his work was accepted in the Pittsburg Salon and the Annual Competition of American Photography. He found work at the camera department of a local Seattle pharmacy and began meeting other Issei, Nisei and Kibei photographers such as Kyo Koike and joined the Seattle Camera Club.

In 1926, Kira moved to Los Angeles with his wife and two young children. Although he was never a member of the Japanese Camera Pictorialists of California, a group that was active in Los Angeles at that time, he developed strong friendships with club members associated with the pictorialist movement of the 1920s and ’30s such as K. Asaishi and T. K. Shindo. In 1928, Kira was named an associate of the Royal Photography Society, and the following year he was made a full fellow and began exhibiting both nationally and internationally. In 1929 alone, Kira exhibited ninety-six works in twenty-five different shows. In the late twenties, he worked at T. Iwata’s art store. In 1931, his photograph The Thinker, made while showing a customer how to use his newly purchased camera properly, appeared on the March 1931 issue of Vanity Fair magazine.

On December 5, two days before the attack on Pearl Harbor, Kira was selected to be included in the 25th Annual International Salon of the Camera Pictorialists of Los Angeles. Within a few months, he was forced to store his camera, photography books and prints in the basement of the Nishi Hongwanji Buddhist Temple in Little Tokyo, Los Angeles for the duration of World War II. He and his family were incarcerated at Santa Anita Assembly Center and the Gila River, Arizona concentration camp from 1942-1944, leaving the latter in April 1944.

Following his release, he lived briefly in Chicago before returning to Los Angeles in 1946, where he remained for the rest of his life. In Los Angeles, he worked as a photo retoucher and printer for the Disney, RKO and Columbia Picture studios but never exhibited again as he had before the war.

Text from the Hiromu Kira page on the Densho Encyclopedia website [Online] Cited 23/02/2020

 

Marinus Jacob Kjeldgaard (Danish, 1884-1964, active Paris, France late 1930s - late 1940s) '[Collage: Balance of Powers]' about 1939

 

Marinus Jacob Kjeldgaard (Danish, 1884-1964, active Paris, France late 1930s – late 1940s)
[Collage: Balance of Powers]
about 1939
Gelatin silver print
28.5 × 32cm (11 1/4 × 12 5/8 in.)
The J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles
© Estate of Marinus Jacob Kjeldgaard

 

Paul Outerbridge (American, 1896-1958) '[Egg in Spotlight]' 1943

 

Paul Outerbridge (American, 1896-1958)
[Egg in Spotlight]
1943
Gelatin silver print
26.4x 34.4cm (10 3/8 x 13 9/16 in.)
The J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles
© 2019 G. Ray Hawkins Gallery, Beverly Hills, CA

 

Emil Cadoo (American, 1926-2002) 'Children of Harlem' 1965

 

Emil Cadoo (American, 1926-2002)
Children of Harlem
1965
Gelatin silver print
20.3 × 25.2cm (8 × 9 15/16 in.)
The J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles, Gift of Joyce Cadoo / Janos Gat Gallery
© Estate of Emil Cadoo, courtesy of Janos Gat Gallery

 

Anthony Hernandez (American, b. 1947) 'Los Angeles #1' 1969

 

Anthony Hernandez (American, b. 1947)
Los Angeles #1
1969
Gelatin silver print
18.9 × 28.4cm (7 7/16 × 11 3/16 in.)
The J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles, Purchased in part with funds provided by the Photographs Council
© Anthony Hernandez

 

William Eggleston (American, b. 1939) 'Dolls on Cadillac, Memphis' 1972

 

William Eggleston (American, b. 1939)
Dolls on Cadillac, Memphis
1972
Chromogenic print
25.4 × 38.1cm (10 × 15 in.)
The J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles
© Eggleston Artistic Trust

 

William Wegman (American, b, 1943) 'Dog and Ball' 1973

 

William Wegman (American, b, 1943)
Dog and Ball
1973
Gelatin silver print
The J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles
© William Wegman

 

Marketa Luskacova (Czech, born 1944) 'Sclater St, Woman with Baby and Girl' 1975

 

Markéta Luskačová (Czech, b. 1944)
Sclater St, Woman with Baby and Girl
1975
Gelatin silver print
21 x 31.8cm (8 1/4 x 12 1/2 in.)
The J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles
© Markéta Luskačová

 

Markéta Luskačová (Czech, b. 1944)

Markéta Luskačová (born 1944) is a Czech photographer known for her series of photographs taken in Slovakia, Britain and elsewhere. Considered one of the best Czech social photographers to date, since the 1990s she has photographed children in the Czech Republic, Slovakia, and also Poland…

In the 1970s and 1980s, the communist censorship attempted to conceal her international reputation. Her works were banned in Czechoslovakia, and the catalogues for the exhibition Pilgrims in the Victoria and Albert Museum were lost on their way to Czechoslovakia.

Luskačová started photographing London’s markets in 1974. In the markets of Portobello Road, Brixton and Spitalfields, she “[found] a vivid Dickensian staging”.

In 2016 she self-published a collection of photographs of street musicians, mostly taken in the markets of east London, under the title To Remember – London Street Musicians 1975-1990, and with an introduction by John Berger.

Text from the Wikipedia website [Online] Cited 23/02/2020

 

Marketa Luskacova (Czech, b. 1944) 'Men around Fire, Spitalfields Market' Negative 1976, print 1991

 

Markéta Luskačová (Czech, b. 1944)
Men around Fire, Spitalfields Market
Negative 1976, print 1991
Gelatin silver print
22.8 x 32.9cm (9 x 12 15/16 in.)
The J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles
© Markéta Luskačová

 

Shigeichi Nagano (Japanese, 1925-2019, active Tokyo, Japan) '[Tokyo, Aobadai (Nishi Saigoyama Park), Meguro Ward]' 1988

 

Shigeichi Nagano (Japanese, 1925-2019)
[Tokyo, Aobadai (Nishi Saigoyama Park), Meguro Ward]
1988
Gelatin silver print
26 × 39.4cm (10 1/4 × 15 1/2 in.)
The J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles, Purchased with funds provided by the Photographs Council
© Shigeichi Nagano

 

Shigeichi Nagano (Japanese, 1925-2019)

During the 1960s Nagano observed the period of intense economic growth in Japan, depicting the lives of Tokyo’s sarariman with some humour. The photographs of this period were only published in book form much later, as Dorīmu eiji and 1960 (1978 and 1990 respectively).

Nagano exhibited recent examples of his street photography in 1986, winning the Ina Nobuo Award. He published several books of his works since then, and won a number of awards. Nagano had a major retrospective at the Tokyo Metropolitan Museum of Photography in 2000.

Nagano died two months short of his 94th birthday, on January 30, 2019.

Text from the Wikipedia website

 

Catherine Opie (American, b. 1961) 'Untitled #15' 1997

 

Catherine Opie (American, b. 1961)
Untitled #15
1997
Inkjet print
40.6 × 104.1cm (16 × 41 in.)
The J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles
© Catherine Opie

 

Nan Goldin (American, b. 1953) 'Self Portrait, Red, Zurich' 2002

 

Nan Goldin (American, b. 1953)
Self Portrait, Red, Zurich
2002
Silver-dye bleach print
Framed (outer dim): 72.4 x 104.1cm (28 1/2 x 41 in.)
The J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles
© Nan Goldin, courtesy of Matthew Marks Gallery and the artist

 

Hong Hao (Chinese, b. 1965) 'My Things No. 5 - 5,000 Pieces of Rubbish' 2002

 

Hong Hao (Chinese, b. 1965)
My Things No. 5 – 5,000 Pieces of Rubbish
2002
Chromogenic print
120 × 210.8cm (47 1/4 × 83 in.)
The J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles, Anonymous Gift
© Hong Hao, Courtesy of Chambers Fine Art

 

Veronika Kellndorfer (German, b. 1962) 'Succulent Screen' 2007

 

Veronika Kellndorfer (German, b. 1962)
Succulent Screen
2007
Silkscreen print on glass
288 × 351.5cm (113 3/8 × 138 3/8 in.)
Gift of Christopher Grimes in honour of Virginia Heckert
The J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles
© Veronika Kellndorfer

 

A three-panel silkscreen print on glass, Succulent Screen depicts a detail view of one of the signature miter-cut windows of Frank Lloyd Wright’s Freeman House. The house was built in the Hollywood Hills in 1923, was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1971 as a California Historical Landmark and as Los Angeles Historic-Cultural Monument #247 in 1981; it was bequeathed to the USC School of Architecture in 1986.

Text from the Getty Museum website

 

Sharon Core (American, b. 1965) 'Early American, Strawberries and Ostrich Egg' 2007

 

Sharon Core (American, b. 1965)
Early American, Strawberries and Ostrich Egg
2007
Chromogenic print
42.8 x 56.8cm (16 7/8 x 22 3/8 in.)
The J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles
© Sharon Core

 

 

The Getty Museum holds one of the largest collections of photographs in the United States, with more than 148,000 prints. However, only a small percentage of these have ever been exhibited at the Museum. To celebrate the 35th anniversary of the founding of the Department of Photographs, the Getty Museum is exhibiting 200 of these never-before-seen photographs and pull back the curtain on the work of the many professionals who care for this important collection in Unseen: 35 Years of Collecting Photographs, on view December 17, 2019 – March 8, 2020.

“Rather than showcasing again the best-known highlights of the collection, the time is right to dig deeper into our extraordinary holdings and present a selection of never-before-seen treasures. I have no doubt that visitors will be intrigued and delighted by the diversity and quality of the collection, whose riches will support exhibition and research well into the decades ahead,” says Timothy Potts, director of the J. Paul Getty Museum.

The exhibition includes photographs by dozens of artists from the birth of the medium in the mid-19th century to the present day. The selection also encompasses a variety of photographic processes, including the delicate cyanotypes of Anna Atkins (British, 1799-1871), Polaroids by Carrie Mae Weems (American, born 1953) and Mary Ellen Mark (American, 1940-2015) and an architectural photographic silkscreen on glass by Veronika Kellndorfer (German, born 1962).

Visual associations among photographs from different places and times illuminate the breadth of the Getty’s holdings and underscore a sense of continuity and change within the history of the medium. The curators have also personalised some of the labels in the central galleries to give voice to their individual insights and perspectives.

 

Growth of the collection

In 1984, as the J. Paul Getty Trust was in the early stages of conceiving what would eventually become the Getty Center, the Getty Museum created its Department of Photographs. It did so with the acquisition of several world-famous private collections, including those of Sam Wagstaff, André Jammes, Arnold Crane, and Volker Kahmen and Georg Heusch. These dramatic acquisitions immediately established the Museum as a leading center for photography.

While the founding collections are particularly strong in 19th and early 20th century European and American work, the department now embraces contemporary photography and, increasingly, work produced around the world. The collection continues to evolve, has been shaped by several generations of curators and benefits from the generosity of patrons and collectors.

 

Behind the scenes

In addition to the photographs on view, the exhibition spotlights members of Getty staff who care for, handle, and monitor these works of art.

“What the general public may not realise is that before a single photograph is hung on a wall, the object and its related data is managed by teams of professional conservators, registrars, curators, mount-makers, and many others,” says Jim Ganz, senior curator of photographs at the Getty Museum. “In addition to exposing works of art in the collection that are not well known, we wanted to shed light on the largely hidden activity that goes into caring for such a collection.”

 

Collecting Contemporary Photography

The department’s collecting of contemporary photography has been given strong encouragement by the Getty Museum Photographs Council, and a section of the exhibition will be dedicated to objects purchased with the Council’s funding. Established in 2005, this group supports the department’s curatorial program, especially with the acquisition of works made after 1945 by artists not yet represented or underrepresented in the collection. Since its founding, the Council has contributed over $3 million toward the purchase of nearly five hundred photographs by artists from Argentina, Australia, Canada, Japan, Korea, Malaysia, South Africa, and Taiwan, as well as Europe and the United States.

 

Looking ahead

The exhibition also looks towards the future of the collection, and includes a gallery of very newly-acquired works by Laura Aguilar (American, 1959-2018), Osamu Shiihara (Japanese, 1905-1974), as well as highlights of the Dennis Reed collection of photographs by Japanese American photographers. The selection represents the department’s strengthening of diversity in front of and behind the camera, the collection of works relevant to Southern California communities, and the acquisition of photographs that expand the understanding of the history of the medium.

“With this exhibition we celebrate the past 35 years of collecting, and look forward to the collection’s continued expansion, encompassing important work by artists all over the world and across three centuries,” adds Potts.

Unseen: 35 Years of Collecting Photographs is on view December 17, 2019 – March 8, 2020 at the Getty Center. The exhibition is organised by Jim Ganz, senior curator of photographs at the Getty Museum in collaboration with Getty curators Mazie Harris, Virginia Heckert, Karen Hellman, Arpad Kovacs, Amanda Maddox, and Paul Martineau.

Press release from the J. Paul Getty Museum [Online] Cited 09/20/2020

 

Hiroshi Sugimoto (Japanese, born 1948) 'Botanical Specimen (Erica mutabolis), March 1839' 2009

 

Hiroshi Sugimoto (Japanese, born 1948)
Botanical Specimen (Erica mutabolis), March 1839
2009
Toned gelatin silver print
93.7 x 74.9cm (36 7/8 x 29 1/2 in.)
© Hiroshi Sugimoto

 

Julia Margaret Cameron (British, born India, 1815-1879) '[Spring]' 1873

 

Julia Margaret Cameron (British born India, 1815-1879)
[Spring]
1873
Albumen silver print
35.4 × 25.7cm (13 15/16 × 10 1/8 in.)
The J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles

 

Reverend William Ellis (British, 1794-1872) and Samuel Smith. '[Portrait of a Black Couple]' about 1873

 

Reverend William Ellis (British, 1794-1872) and Samuel Smith
[Portrait of a Black Couple]
about 1873
Albumen silver print
24.1 × 18.6cm (9 1/2 × 7 5/16 in.)
The J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles

 

Prince Roland Napoleon Bonaparte (French, 1858-1924) 'Jacobus Huch, 26 ans' about 1888

 

Prince Roland Napoleon Bonaparte (French, 1858-1924)
Jacobus Huch, 26 ans
about 1888
Albumen silver print
15.9 × 10.9cm (6 1/4 × 4 5/16 in.)
The J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles

 

Underwood & Underwood (American, founded 1881, dissolved 1940s) 'Les Chiens du Front, eux-mems, portent des masques contre les gaz' May 27, 1917

 

Underwood & Underwood (American, founded 1881, dissolved 1940s)
Les Chiens du Front, eux-mems, portent des masques contre les gaz
May 27, 1917
Rotogravure
22 × 20.4cm (8 11/16 × 8 1/16 in.)
The J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles

 

László Moholy-Nagy (American, born Hungary, 1895-1946) '[The Law of the Series]' 1925

 

László Moholy-Nagy (American born Hungary, 1895-1946)
[The Law of the Series]
1925
Gelatin silver print
21.6 × 16.2cm (8 1/2 × 6 3/8 in.)
The J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles
© 2019 Estate of László Moholy-Nagy / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York

 

Martin Munkácsi (American, born Hungary, 1896-1963) 'Big Dummies' 1927-1933

 

Martin Munkácsi (American born Hungary, 1896-1963)
Big Dummies
1927-1933
Gelatin silver print
33.5 × 26.7cm (13 3/16 × 10 1/2 in.)
The J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles
© Estate of Martin Munkácsi, Courtesy Howard Greenberg Gallery, New York

 

Munkácsi was a newspaper writer and photographer in Hungary, specialising in sports. At the time, sports action photography could only be done in bright light outdoors. Munkácsi’s innovation was to make sport photographs as meticulously composed action photographs, which required both artistic and technical skill.

Munkácsi’s break was to happen upon a fatal brawl, which he photographed. Those photos affected the outcome of the trial of the accused killer, and gave Munkácsi considerable notoriety. That notoriety helped him get a job in Berlin in 1928, for Berliner Illustrirte Zeitung, where his first published photo was a motorcycle splashing its way through a puddle. He also worked for the fashion magazine Die Dame.

More than just sports and fashion, he photographed Berliners, rich and poor, in all their activities. He traveled to Turkey, Sicily, Egypt, London, New York, and Liberia, for photo spreads in Berliner Illustrirte Zeitung.

The speed of the modern age and the excitement of new photographic viewpoints enthralled him, especially flying. There are aerial photographs; there are air-to-air photographs of a flying school for women; there are photographs from a Zeppelin, including the ones on his trip to Brazil, where he crossed over a boat whose passengers wave to the airship above.

On 21 March 1933, he photographed the fateful Day of Potsdam, when the aged President Paul von Hindenburg handed Germany over to Adolf Hitler. On assignment for Berliner Illustrirte Zeitung, he photographed Hitler’s inner circle, although he was a Jewish foreigner.

Munkácsi left for New York City… Munkácsi died in poverty and controversy. Several universities and museums declined to accept his archives, and they were scattered around the world.

Text from the Wikipedia website [Online] Cited 23/02/2020

 

Erwin Blumenfeld (American, born Germany, 1897-1969) 'Hitlerfresse (Hitler's Mug)' January 30, 1933

 

Erwin Blumenfeld (American born Germany, 1897-1969)
Hitlerfresse (Hitler’s Mug)
January 30, 1933
Gelatin silver print collage with ink
29.2 × 21.3cm (11 1/2 × 8 3/8 in.)
The J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles
© The Estate of Erwin Blumenfeld

 

Erwin Blumenfeld (American born Germany, 1897-1969)

Blumenfeld was born in Berlin on 26 January 1897. As a young man he worked in the clothes trade and wrote poetry. In 1918 he went to Amsterdam, where he came into contact with Paul Citroen and Georg Grosz. In 1933 he made a photomontage showing Hitler as a skull with a swastika on its forehead; this image was later used in Allied propaganda material in 1943.

He married Lena Citroen, with whom he had three children, in 1921. In 1922 he started a leather goods shop, which failed in 1935. He moved to Paris, where in 1936 he set up as a photographer and did free-lance work for French Vogue. After the outbreak of the Second World War he was placed in an internment camp; in 1941 he was able to emigrate to the United States. There he soon became a successful and well-paid fashion photographer, and worked as a free-lancer for Harper’s Bazaar, Life and American Vogue. Blumenfeld died in Rome on 4 July 1969.

Text from the Wikipedia website [Online] Cited 23/02/3030

 

Paul Wolff (German, 1887-1951) and Dr Wolff & Tritschler OHG (German, founded 1927, dissolved 1963) '[Dog at the beach]' 1936

 

Paul Wolff (German, 1887-1951) and Dr Wolff & Tritschler OHG (German, founded 1927, dissolved 1963)
[Dog at the beach]
1936
Gelatin silver print
23.4 x 17.8cm (9 3/16 x 7 in.)
The J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles
© Dr Paul Wolff & Tritschler, Historisches Bildarchiv, D-77654 Offenburg, Germany

 

Barbara Morgan (American, 1900 - 1992) 'City Shell' 1938

 

Barbara Morgan (American, 1900-1992)
City Shell
1938
Gelatin silver print
49.2 × 39.4cm (19 3/8 × 15 1/2 in.)
Reproduced courtesy of the Barbara and Willard Morgan Photographs and Papers, Library Special Collections, Charles E. Young Research Library, UCLA
The J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles

 

Walker Evans (American, 1903 - 1975) '[Two Giraffes, Circus Winter Quarters, Sarasota]' 1941

 

Walker Evans (American, 1903-1975)
[Two Giraffes, Circus Winter Quarters, Sarasota]
1941
Gelatin silver print
15.1 × 18.3cm (5 15/16 × 7 3/16 in.)
The J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles
© Walker Evans Archive, The Metropolitan Museum of Art

 

Horst P. Horst (American, born Germany, 1906-1999) 'Hands, Hands' 1941

 

Horst P. Horst (American born Germany, 1906-1999)
Hands, Hands
1941
Platinum and palladium print
23.7 × 17cm (9 5/16 × 6 11/16 in.)
The J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles, Gift of Manfred Heiting
© The Estate of Horst P. Horst and Condé Nast

 

Erwin Blumenfeld (American, born Germany, 1897-1969) 'Maroua Motherwell, New York' 1941-1943

 

Erwin Blumenfeld (American, born Germany, 1897-1969)
Maroua Motherwell, New York
1941-1943
Gelatin silver print
48.5 x 38.7cm (19 1/8 x 15 1/4 in.)
The J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles
© The Estate of Erwin Blumenfeld

 

Henry Holmes Smith (American, 1909-1986) 'Photography Student' 1947

 

Henry Holmes Smith (American, 1909-1986)
Photography Student
1947
Gelatin silver print
11.4 × 9.6cm (4 1/2 × 3 3/4 in.)
The J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles, Gift of the Smith Family Trust
© J. Paul Getty Trust

 

Henry Holmes Smith (American, 1909-1986)

Henry Holmes Smith (1909-1986) was an American photographer and one of the most influential fine art photography teachers of the mid 20th century. He was inspired by the work that had been done at the German Bauhaus and in 1937 was invited to teach photography at the New Bauhaus being founded by Moholy-Nagy in Chicago. After World War II, he spent many years teaching at Indiana University. His students included Jerry Uelsmann, Jack Welpott, Robert W. Fichter, Betty Hahn and Jaromir Stephany.

Smith was often involved in the cutting edge of photographic techniques: in 1931 he started experimenting with high-speed flash photography of action subjects, and started doing colour work in 1936 when few people considered it a serious artistic medium. His later images were nearly all abstract, often made directly (without a camera, i.e. like photograms), for instance images created by refracting light through splashes of water and corn syrup on a glass plate. However, although acclaimed as a photographic teacher, Holmes’ own photographs and other images did not achieve any real recognition from his peers.

Text from the Wikipedia website [Online] Cited 23/02/2020

 

Andreas Feininger (American, born France, 1906-1999) 'Elegant Disk Clam, dosinia elegans, Conrad' 1948

 

Andreas Feininger (American born France, 1906-1999)
Elegant Disk Clam, dosinia elegans, Conrad
1948
Gelatin silver print
30.4 x 23.8cm (11 15/16 x 9 3/8 in.)
The J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles
© Estate of Gertrud E. Feininger

 

Alexander Rodchenko (Russian, 1891-1956) 'Roll (of Film)' 1950

 

Alexander Rodchenko (Russian, 1891-1956)
Roll (of Film)
1950
Gelatin silver print
30.5 × 24cm (12 × 9 7/16 in.)
The J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles
© 2019 Estate of Alexander Rodchenko / UPRAVIS, Moscow / Artists Rights Society, NY

 

Otto Steinert (German, 1915-1978) 'Schlammweiher 2' Negative 1953, print about 1960s

 

Otto Steinert (German, 1915-1978)
Schlammweiher 2
Negative 1953, print about 1960s
Gelatin silver print
39.6 x 29.1cm (15 9/16 x 11 7/16 in.)
The J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles
Courtesy Galerie Johannes Faber

 

André Kertész (American, born Hungary, 1894-1985) 'Still Life with Snake' Negative 1960; print later

 

André Kertész (American born Hungary, 1894-1985)
Still Life with Snake
Negative 1960; print later
Gelatin silver print
Image: 24.8 × 19.7cm (9 3/4 × 7 3/4 in.)
The J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles
© Estate of André Kertész

 

Malick Sidibé (Malian, 1936-2016) 'Vues de dos' Nd, print 2003

 

Malick Sidibé (Malian, 1936-2016)
Vues de dos
Nd, print 2003
Gelatin silver print, glass, paint, cardboard, tape, and string
36.5 x 27cm (14 3/8 x 10 5/8 in.)
The J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles
© Estate of Malick Sidibé

 

Irving Penn (American, 1917-2009) 'Red Apples' July 15, 1985

 

Irving Penn (American, 1917-2009)
Red Apples
July 15, 1985
Silver-dye bleach print
25.4 × 20.3cm (10 × 8 in.)
The J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles, Gift of Nancy and Bruce Berman
© 1985 Irving Penn

 

Lyle Ashton Harris (American, b. 1965) 'Man and Woman #1' 1987-1988

 

Lyle Ashton Harris (American, b. 1965)
Man and Woman #1
1987-1988
Gelatin silver print
74.3 x 48.9cm (29 1/4 x 19 1/4 in.)
The J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles
© Lyle Ashton Harris

 

Jim Dow (American, b. 1942) 'Doll Repair Shop Window, Buenos Aires, Argentina' 1990

 

Jim Dow (American, b. 1942)
Doll Repair Shop Window, Buenos Aires, Argentina
1990
Chromogenic print
51.2 × 40.6cm (20 3/16 × 16 in.)
The J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles, Gift of Nancy and Bruce Berman
© Jim Dow

 

Carrie Mae Weems (American, b. 1953) 'See No Evil' 1991

 

Carrie Mae Weems (American, b. 1953)
See No Evil
1991
Dye diffusion print (Polaroid Polacolor)
61 × 50.5cm (24 × 19 7/8 in.)
The J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles, Gift of Daniel Greenberg and Susan Steinhauser
© Carrie Mae Weems

 

Myoung Ho Lee (South Korean, b. 1975) '[Tree #2]' 2006

 

Myoung Ho Lee (South Korean, b. 1975)
[Tree #2]
2006
Inkjet print
39.8 × 32.1cm (15 11/16 × 12 5/8 in.)
The J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles, Purchased with funds provided by the Photographs Council
© Myoung Ho Lee, Courtesy Yossi Milo Gallery, New York

 

Daniel Naudé (South African, born 1984) 'Africanis 18. Murraysburg, Western Cape, 10 May 2010' 2010

 

Daniel Naudé (South African, b. 1984)
Africanis 18. Murraysburg, Western Cape, 10 May 2010
2010
60 x 60cm (23 5/8 x 23 5/8 in.)
The J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles
© Daniel Naudé

 

Pieter Hugo (South African, born 1976) 'Aissah Salifu, Agbogbloshie Market, Accra, Ghana' 2010

 

Pieter Hugo (South African, b. 1976)
Aissah Salifu, Agbogbloshie Market, Accra, Ghana
2010
From the Permanent Error series
Digital chromogenic print
81.3 x 81.3cm (32 x 32 in.)
The J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles
© Pieter Hugo

 

Mona Kuhn (German, born Brazil, 1969) 'Portrait 37' 2011

 

Mona Kuhn (German born Brazil, 1969)
Portrait 37
2011
Chromogenic print
38.3 x 38.1cm (15 1/16 x 15 in.)
The J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles
© Mona Kuhn

 

Alison Rossiter (American, b. 1953) 'Eastman Kodak Azo E, expired May 1927, processed 2014' 2014

 

Alison Rossiter (American, b. 1953)
Eastman Kodak Azo E, expired May 1927, processed 2014
2014
Gelatin silver print
25 x 20cm (9 13/16 x 7 7/8 in.)
The J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles
© Alison Rossiter

 

 

The J. Paul Getty Museum
1200 Getty Center Drive
Los Angeles, California 90049

Opening hours:
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Exhibition: ‘Into the Woods: Trees in Photography’ at the Victoria and Albert Museum, London

Exhibition dates: 18th November 2017 – 22nd April 2018

 

Gustave Le Gray (French, 1820-1884) 'In the Forest of Fontainbleau (Bas-Bréau)' 1852

 

Gustave Le Gray (French, 1820-1884)
In the Forest of Fontainbleau (Bas-Bréau)
1852
Gold-toned albumen print from waxed paper negative
Chauncey Hare Townshend Bequest 1868

 

Gustave Le Gray trained as a painter in the 1840s but took up photography soon after. He followed the Barbizon School painters to the French forest of Fontainebleau, where he made enchanting photographic studies. Combining technical knowledge with artistic flair, Le Gray rapidly became one of the most renowned photographers of his day.

 

 

I grew up on a farm for the first thirteen years of my life. I played in the fields and forests of England, and wandered the cart paths with my brother. I saw him for the first time in thirty years last August, after the passing of my father. We went back and walked those very same paths where we grew up and looked at the magnificent trees planted along the edge of the fields. After all that had happened, it was an emotional and healing journey for both of us…

The innocence of being a child growing up on the land returned, the innocence of something that is never really forgotten. I still am a country boy at heart; I still love the land and the trees. I always will.

It’s a pity then, that this seems to be just a “filler” exhibition from the V&A. No press release, two sentences on the website (see below) and no information about the images such as details of process etc… I had to dig into the collection to find the information you read here, including the text descriptions beneath the images. For such a magical and mythical subject that has fascinated human beings since the beginning of time, you might have expected a more in depth investigation.

As an addendum I have included my favourite tree images. You will have your own. The last image in particular has that element of threat and wonder that makes the forest such a rich, fluid and evocative space.

Dr Marcus Bunyan


Many thankx to the V&A for allowing me to publish the photographs in the posting. Please click on the photographs for a larger version of the image.

 

 

Trees have long been a source of inspiration for artists. This display explores the diverse representation of trees in photography – as botanical subjects and poetic symbols, in the context of the natural and human worlds.

 

Royal Engineers. 'Cutting on the 49th Parallel, on the Right Bank of the Mooyie River Looking West' about 1860

 

Royal Engineers
Cutting on the 49th Parallel, on the Right Bank of the Mooyie River Looking West
about 1860
Albumen print from wet collodion-on-glass negative
Photographed by a Royal Engineers photographer on a U.S.-Canada Border Survey
Received from the Foreign Office 1863

 

In 1856 the War Department appointed the South Kensington Museum photographer Charles Thurston Thompson to teach photography to the Royal Engineers. On one expedition these soldier-photographers documented the border between the USA and Canada. From the crest of the Rockies westwards along the 49th Parallel to the coast, they painstakingly recorded everything that crossed their path, producing ‘one of the earliest significant bodies of photographs made in the Pacific Northwest’.

 

Samuel Bourne (British, 1834-1912) 'Poplar Avenue, Srinuggur, Kashmir, from the end' 1864

 

Samuel Bourne (British, 1834-1912)
Poplar Avenue, Srinuggur, Kashmir, from the end
1864
Albumen print from wet collodion negative

 

In 1863 Samuel Bourne (1834-1912) arrived in India. He had left his job as a Nottingham bank clerk in order to develop his new career as a photographer. Bourne undertook three treks to Kashmir and the western Himalayas in 1863, 1864 and 1866, during which he photographed his surroundings extensively.

He began his second trip to India, during which this photograph was taken, in March 1864. It was to be a nine-month expedition through the Kashmir region. Throughout his travels Bourne wrote about his first impressions of the places he visited and these writings were published in the British Journal of Photography. Of his first impressions of the poplar avenues at Srinagar he noted: “The next day was devoted to an ascent of the Takht Hill and a stroll among the poplar avenues, of which, as I before stated, there are several about Srinugger. One of them is known as the “poplar avenue,” and is a mile long and quite straight. This is a fine walk and is almost perfect-hardly a tree is wanting, and the effect on looking down it is very striking. It is carpeted with grassy turf and a level grassy plain stretches on each side of it; at right angles to this are the three or four smaller avenues extending to the river, a walk down which when the grapes are ripe is by no means an enjoyable exercise, if one be a good climber. Running up, and entwining themselves among the poplars to a height of ninety or a hundred feet, are numbers of vines, whose tempting clusters hanging at this elevation only mock the wistful, watery eyes cast up to them.” Bourne, S. “Narrative of a Photographic Trip to Kashmir (Cashmere) and the Adjacent Districts,” in The British Journal of Photography, 23 January 1867, p. 38.

Towards the end of the 1860s, Bourne established a partnership with fellow photographer and Englishman Charles Shepherd (fl. 1858-1878) and in the space of a few years Bourne & Shepherd became the pre-eminent photographic firm in India. By the end of 1870 they had three branches, in Simla, Calcutta and Bombay.

Samuel Bourne’s ability to combine technical skill and artistic vision has led to him being recognised today as one of the most outstanding photographers working in India in the nineteenth century.

 

Alfred Stieglitz (American, 1864-1946) 'Poplars, Lake George' 1932

 

Alfred Stieglitz (American, 1864-1946)
Poplars, Lake George
1932
Gelatin silver print
© Alfred Stieglitz, Gift of the Georgia O’Keeffe Foundation

 

Lake George was the family estate where Stieglitz spent his summers, often with his wife, the painter Georgia O’Keefe. However, he took this photograph when O’Keefe was away in New Mexico. The loneliness of separation led Stieglitz to contemplate his own mortality, a theme reflected in this representation of poplars. Perhaps he identified with the trees’ dwindling vitality, as he photographed them repeatedly that summer, almost as one might check one’s pulse.

 

Ansel Adams (American, 1902-1984) 'Aspens, Northern New Mexico' 1958

 

Ansel Adams (American, 1902-1984)
Aspens, Northern New Mexico
1958
Gelatin silver print
Given by Virginia and Ansel Adams

 

Ansel Adams is well-known for his portrayal of the mountain ranges, deserts, rivers and skies of the western United States. Adams was a passionate lover of the vast American wilderness and an active conservationist. He commented, “my approach to photography is based on my belief in the vigour and values of the world of nature – in the aspects of grandeur and of the minutiae all about us.” Having trained as a pianist before turning to photography in 1927, Adams often discussed his process of composition in musical terms.

 

Gerhard Stromberg (Germany, England b. 1952) 'Coppice (King's Wood)' 1994

 

Gerhard Stromberg (Germany, England b. 1952)
Coppice (King’s Wood)
1994
C-type print
© Gerhard Stromberg

 

Gerhard Stromberg is one of the foremost contemporary photographers working with the subject of the British landscape. His images demonstrate how constructed this landscape can be. The subtle, large format prints (5 x 6 ft approx.) allow the viewer to contemplate details that reveal the photographers’ intimacy and familiarity with the subject. This piece is one of the most representative of his works.

A C-type print, such as Ektachrome, is a colour print in which the print material has at least three emulsion layers of light sensitive silver salts. Each layer is sensitised to a different primary colour – either red, blue or green – and so records different information about the colour make-up of the image. During printing, chemicals are added which form dyes of the appropriate colour in the emulsion layers. It is the most common type of colour photograph.

 

Mark Edwards (British, b. 1951) 'Rotting Apples' 2004

 

Mark Edwards (British, b. 1951)
Rotting Apples
2004
From the series What Has Been Gathered Will Disperse
C-type print
Purchased through the Cecil Beaton Royalties Fund
© Mark Edwards

 

This image of apples lying rotten on a peacock blue carpet was taken in a family garden on a Norfolk nature reserve. The owners use pieces of old carpet, often donated by a neighbouring Buddhist retreat, as weed control. The decorative juxtaposition of the natural with the man-made moved Mark Edwards to record the carpet as it became integrated into the fabric of the garden. The photograph hints at ideas of contemplation and the passage of time.

 

Tokihiro Sato (Japanese, b. 1957) 'Hakkoda #2' 2009

 

Tokihiro Sato (Japanese, b. 1957)
Hakkoda #2
2009
Gelatin silver print
Purchased with the support of the Photographs Acquisition Group
© Tokihiro Sato, Courtesy Leslie Tonkonow Artworks + Projects

 

This photograph embodies Sato’s ephemeral imagination. It was made in the primeval Hakkoda forest, in northern Honshu on the main island of Japan. The image reveals a long fascination with the sculptural form of the Japanese Beech tree. Sato has said that to him ‘these trees suggest the ancient continental origins of the Japanese people while representing masculine strength and feminine sensitivity’. To make the picture, he exposed large-format film, during which he moved in front of the camera with a mirror reflecting the sun’s rays. The power of the sun momentarily ‘blinds’ the camera, creating an area that registers on film as an intense flare of light. Although we know that Sato is standing somewhere in the scene, we struggle to locate precisely where. While his traces are like pinpoint coordinates on a map, all we can do is estimate his continually moving location and follow the possible connecting trails. In this way, his photographs can be seen as enigmatic sculptural or physical performances. Knowing how Sato makes his images, we recognise there is not a multiplicity of presences indicated by the lights, but instead a multiplicity of one presence: the artist’s. His omnipresence might be a hint of some kind of divinity: the ever-present force of an invisible creator. Or it may simply be a record of the movement of one human force. However it is interpreted, human or divine, the light is a kind of mark that asserts both transcendence and specificity: “I was here,” even if, as in life, it is only momentarily.

 

Tal Shochat (Israeli, b. 1974) 'Rimon (Pomegranate)' 2011

 

Tal Shochat (Israeli, b. 1974)
Rimon (Pomegranate)
2011
C-type print
© Tal Shochat

 

Shochat applies the conventions of studio portraiture to photographing trees. The first stage in her meticulous process is to identify the perfect specimen of a particular type of tree. When the fruit is at the height of maturity, she cleans the dust off the branches, leaves and fruit. Finally, Shochat photographs the tree, artificially lit and isolated against a black cloth background. The photographs present a view of nature that would never actually exist in a natural environment. The work highlights the tensions in photography between reality and artifice.

 

Awoiska van der Molen (Dutch, b. 1972) '#274-5' 2011

 

Awoiska van der Molen (Dutch, b. 1972)
#274-5
2011
From the series Sequester
Oil based pigment ink on Japanese Gampi paper, presented in a handmade linen box
Purchased with the support of the Photographs Acquisition Group
© Awoiska van der Molen

 

Awoiska van der Molen (b. 1972, Groningen, Netherlands) is a Dutch photographer based in Amsterdam. She studied architecture and photography at the Academy of Fine Arts Minerva in Groningen. In 2003 she graduated from the St. Joost Academy of Art and Design in the Netherlands with an MFA in Photographic Studies. Her work is borne out of an immersion in nature and is concerned with the untamed landscape and the sense of solitude that can be experienced in isolated locations. She works with analogue technology and explains that her pictures should be ‘understood as a metaphysical quest, a journey to the essence of being.’

For the project Sequester, van der Molen walked alone in the Canary Islands, seeking to ‘gain access to the stoic nature of the landscape’, as she describes it. She made long exposure black-and-white pictures of the dramatic volcanic terrain and dense forests at dawn and dusk. The exposures could be as long as thirty minutes and result in photographs of great intensity and ambiguity.

Van der Molen’s photographs go beyond the long tradition of black and white landscape photography, exemplified by photographers in the V&A collection such as Gustave Le Gray, Samuel Bourne, Ansel Adams, and Edward Weston. Rather than emulating the visual approaches of past masters, she seeks to portray the inner condition that uninhabited natural spaces engender.

Her interest in psychological states in relation to landscape can be aligned with that of numerous contemporary practitioners, including Chrystel Lebas and Nicholas Hughes, whose landscape photographs are also created using long exposures and convey a similar atmosphere of primeval power and solitude.

The collotype process is a screenless photomechanical process that allows high-quality prints from continuous-tone photographic negatives. Collotypes are comprised of many layers of ink and have a velvety matte appearance; the process has the power to produce the depth and detail of these works faithfully. Other examples of collotypes in the collection largely date from the 19th century and include works by Eadweard Muybridge and Julia Margaret Cameron. Once a widespread process, today, there are only two professional collotype studios remaining, both of which are in Kyoto.

In 2014, van der Molen received the Japanese Hariban Award, which gave her the opportunity to collaborate with the master printmakers of the Benrido Collotype Atelier in Kyoto to produce this set of 8 collotypes from the Sequester project.

 

Addendum

 

Carleton Watkins (American, 1829-1916) 'Yosemite Valley from the "Best General View"' 1866

 

Carleton Watkins (American, 1829-1916)
Yosemite Valley from the “Best General View”
1866
From the album Photographs of the Yosemite Valley
Albumen print
Lent by Department of Special Collections, Stanford University Libraries

 

Carleton Watkins had the ability to photograph a subject from the viewpoint that allowed the most information to be revealed about its contents. In this image, he captured what he considered the best features of Yosemite Valley: Bridalveil Falls, Cathedral Rock, Half Dome, and El Capitan. By positioning the camera so that the base of the slender tree appears to grow from the bottom edge of the picture, Watkins composed the photograph so that the canyon rim and the open space beyond it seem to intersect. Although he sacrificed the top of the tree, he was able to place the miniaturised Yosemite Falls at the visual centre of the picture. To alleviate the monotony of an empty sky, he added the clouds from a second negative. This image was taken while Watkins was working for the California Geological Survey. His two thousand pounds of equipment for the expedition, which included enough glass for over a hundred negatives, required a train of six mules.

Text from the J. Paul Getty Museum website

 

Albert Renger-Patzsch (German, 1897-1966) 'Das Bäumchen [Sapling]' 1928

 

Albert Renger-Patzsch (German, 1897-1966)
Das Bäumchen (The little tree)
1928
Galerie Berinson, Berlin
© Albert Renger-Patzsch / Archiv Ann und Jürgen Wilde, Zülpich / ADAGP, Paris 2017

 

Alfred Stieglitz (American, 1864-1946) 'Dancing Trees' 1922

 

Alfred Stieglitz (American, 1864-1946)
Dancing Trees
1922
Photograph, palladium print
Gift of Alfred Stieglitz
Photograph: © Museum of Fine Arts, Boston

 

Ansel Adams (American, 1902-1984) 'Edward Weston, Carmel Highlands, California' 1945

 

Ansel Adams (American, 1902-1984)
Edward Weston, Carmel Highlands, California
1945
Gelatin silver print

 

Wynn Bullock (American, 1902-1975) 'Child on Forest Road' 1958, printed 1973

 

Wynn Bullock (American, 1902-1975)
Child on Forest Road
1958
Gelatin silver print
© Bullock Family Photography LLC. All rights reserved

 

 

Victoria and Albert Museum
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Phone: +44 (0)20 7942 2000

Opening hours:
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Exhibition: ‘Carelton Watkins: The Stanford Albums’ at the Cantor Arts Center at Stanford University

Who are the interesting photographers anywhere who are alive now?

And my answer would be: there are very few who are alive now that are interesting.

Exhibition dates: 23rd April – 17th August 2014

 

Carleton Watkins (U.S.A., 1829-1916) 'Sugar Loaf Islands and Seal Rocks, Farallons' 1868-1869

 

Carleton Watkins (American, 1829-1916)
Sugar Loaf Islands and Seal Rocks, Farallons
1868-1869
From the album Photographs of the Pacific Coast
Albumen print
Lent by Department of Special Collections, Stanford University Libraries.

 

 

Who would you put in your top eleven photographers of all time?

(in no particular order)

  • Minor White
  • Eugene Atget
  • Frederick Sommer
  • Carelton Watkins
  • Julia Margaret Cameron
  • Walker Evans
  • Edward Weston
  • Lee Friedlander
  • Manuel Alvarez Bravo
  • Diane Arbus
  • Paul Strand

and then it gets a bit more difficult…

Is it a Josef Sudek, Robert Adams, Aaron Siskind, Man Ray, Berenice Abbott, Helen Levitt, Emmet Gowin, William Clift, Ernest Cole, William Eggleston, Lee Friedlander, Cindy Sherman, Charles Marville, Vivian Maier, Saul Leiter and suggestions from others – André Kertész, Josef Koudelka, Dorothea Lange, Henri Cartier-Bresson, Edouard Boubat, Paul Caponigro, etc …

 

What is more interesting is to ask:

Who are the interesting photographers anywhere who are alive now?

And my answer would be: there are very few who are alive now that are interesting.

That is – by looking at the ideas that are present in poetry, music, philosophy or even politics – who is there that is truly taking these ideas forward (or ideas that are as interesting).

Or who is arranging images with the elegance of a Sommer or an Atget or the dynamics of Arbus

= few if any.

In other words whose acts am I hanging upon, so that I am waiting with great anticipation to see what they are going to do next.

Only a few is my answer.

Which living photographers would I walk a mile to see their work?

= some (eg Lee Friedlander, Wolfgang Tillmans)

 

Which living Australian photographers would I walk an hour in the hot January sun to see?

= possibly two (Bill Henson, Rosemary Laing)

Dr Marcus Bunyan

.
PS. Just look at Cape Horn, near Celilo (1867, below). You are not likely to see a more magnificent landscape photograph than this.

Many thankx to the Cantor Arts Center for allowing me to publish the photographs in the posting. Please click on the photographs for a larger version of the image.

 

 

Carleton Watkins (U.S.A., 1829-1916) 'Devils' Cañon Geysers, Looking Up' c. 1867

 

Carleton Watkins (American, 1829-1916)
Devils’ Cañon Geysers, Looking Up
c. 1867
From the album Photographs of the Pacific Coast
Albumen print
Lent by Department of Special Collections, Stanford University Libraries

 

Carleton Watkins (U.S.A., 1829-1916) 'Devils' Cañon Geysers, Looking Up' (detail) c. 1867

 

Carleton Watkins (American, 1829-1916)
Devils’ Cañon Geysers, Looking Up (detail)
c. 1867
From the album Photographs of the Pacific Coast
Albumen print
Lent by Department of Special Collections, Stanford University Libraries

 

Carleton Watkins (U.S.A., 1829-1916) 'Alcatraz from North Point' 1862–1863

 

Carleton Watkins (American, 1829-1916)
Alcatraz from North Point
1862–1863
From the album Photographs of the Pacific Coast
Albumen print
Lent by Department of Special Collections, Stanford University Libraries

 

Carleton Watkins (U.S.A., 1829-1916) 'The Wreck of the Viscata' March 1868

 

Carleton Watkins (American, 1829-1916)
The Wreck of the Viscata
March 1868
From the album Photographs of the Pacific Coast
Albumen print
Lent by Department of Special Collections, Stanford University Libraries

 

Carleton Watkins (U.S.A., 1829-1916) 'Magenta Flume Nevada Co. Cal.' c. 1871

 

Carleton Watkins (American, 1829-1916)
Magenta Flume Nevada Co. Cal.
c. 1871
From the album Photographs of the Pacific Coast
Albumen print
Lent by Department of Special Collections, Stanford University Libraries

 

Carleton Watkins (U.S.A., 1829-1916) 'Flour and Woolen Mills, Oregon City' 1867

 

Carleton Watkins (American, 1829-1916)
Flour and Woolen Mills, Oregon City
1867
From the album Photographs of the Columbia River and Oregon
Albumen print. Lent by Department of Special Collections, Stanford University Libraries

 

Carleton Watkins (U.S.A., 1829-1916) 'Cape Horn, Columbia River' 1867

 

Carleton Watkins (American, 1829-1916)
Cape Horn, Columbia River
1867
From the album Photographs of the Columbia River and Oregon
Albumen print
Lent by Department of Special Collections, Stanford University Libraries

 

Carleton Watkins (U.S.A., 1829-1916) 'Mt. Hood and the Dalles, Columbia River' 1867

 

Carleton Watkins (American, 1829-1916)
Mt. Hood and the Dalles, Columbia River
1867
From the album Photographs of the Columbia River and Oregon
Albumen print
Lent by Department of Special Collections, Stanford University Libraries

 

Carleton Watkins (U.S.A., 1829-1916) 'Cape Horn, near Celilo' 1867

 

Carleton Watkins (American, 1829-1916)
Cape Horn, near Celilo
1867
From the album Photographs of the Columbia River and Oregon
Albumen print
Lent by Department of Special Collections, Stanford University Libraries

 

Carleton Watkins (U.S.A., 1829-1916) 'The Yosemite Valley from the "Best General View"' 1866

 

Carleton Watkins (American, 1829-1916)
The Yosemite Valley from the “Best General View”
1866
From the album Photographs of the Yosemite Valley
Albumen print
Lent by Department of Special Collections, Stanford University Libraries

 

Carleton Watkins (U.S.A., 1829-1916) 'Cathedral Rocks, 2630 ft., Yosemite' 1865-1866

 

Carleton Watkins (American, 1829-1916)
Cathedral Rocks, 2630 ft., Yosemite
1865-1866
From the album Photographs of the Yosemite Valley
Albumen print
Lent by Department of Special Collections, Stanford University Libraries

 

Carleton Watkins (U.S.A., 1829-1916) 'Pompompasos, the Three Brothers, Yosemite 4480 ft.' 1865-1866

 

Carleton Watkins (American, 1829-1916)
Pompompasos, the Three Brothers, Yosemite 4480 ft.
1865-1866
From the album Photographs of the Yosemite Valley
Albumen print
Lent by Department of Special Collections, Stanford University Libraries

 

Carleton Watkins (U.S.A., 1829-1916) 'Mirror View of the North Dome, Yosemite' 1865-1866

 

Carleton Watkins (American, 1829-1916)
Mirror View of the North Dome, Yosemite
1865-1866
From the album Photographs of the Yosemite Valley
Albumen print
Lent by Department of Special Collections, Stanford University Libraries

 

 

Born in upstate New York, Carleton Watkins (1829-1916) ventured west in 1849 to strike it rich. But instead of prospecting for gold, Watkins developed a talent for photography – a medium invented only 22 years before. He documented the remote Pacific Coast in the 1860s and 1870s, capturing its vast scale and spirit with a custom-built camera that created “mammoth” 18 x 22-inch glass-plate negatives. In June 1864, his stunning photographs of Yosemite’s valley, waterfalls and peaks proved instrumental in convincing President Abraham Lincoln and the 38th U.S. Congress to pass the Yosemite Valley Grant Act, legislation that preserved the land for public use and set a precedent for America’s National Park System.

As the nation celebrates the 150th Anniversary of the Yosemite Grant, the Cantor Arts Center at Stanford University presents Carleton Watkins: The Stanford Albums, an exhibition featuring more than 80 original mammoth prints from three unique albums of Watkins’s work: Photographs of the Yosemite Valley (1861 and 1865-66), Photographs of the Pacific Coast (1862-76), and Photographs of the Columbia River and Oregon (1867 and 1870). The exhibition will be on view April 23 through August 17, 2014. Also featured will be cartographic visualisations developed in collaboration with Stanford’s Center for Spatial and Textual Analysis and the Bill Lane Center for the American West, which provide dynamic context for the geography and natural history of Watkins’s photographs. A fully illustrated publication will accompany the exhibition.

“The Cantor is thrilled to be leading such an innovative, interdisciplinary effort to look at Watkins’s work anew,” says Connie Wolf, the Cantor’s John & Jill Freidenrich Director. “These extraordinary albums from Stanford University Libraries’ singular collection provide us with an unparalleled opportunity to examine Watkins’s place in the history of photography, and to more fully understand the critical role photography played in the preservation, promotion, and development of the West. It is fascinating to note that Watkins and Leland Stanford were contemporaries. Watkins even photographed Stanford’s family, making this university a proud and apt home for these albums.”

 

The Albums

Photographs of the Yosemite Valley (1861 and 1865-1866)

In 1861, Watkins loaded up a team of mules with nearly a ton of photographic equipment including a mobile darkroom tent, a dangerous assortment of flammable chemicals, and an enormous custom-built camera that produced “mammoth” 18 x 22-inch glass-plate negatives. He headed 75 miles into the rugged and remote Yosemite Valley on a sometimes perilous journey to capture the natural wonders of the Sierra Nevada. The technical challenges of creating wet-plate negatives in the field were immense. Dust and grit could easily ruin the work as the plates were coated, exposed for up to an hour, and developed. Water had to be carried great distances. The sun warped and shrank camera parts. But the resulting suite of photographs became an international sensation – not only because they provided virtual access to one of America’s grandest wilderness areas but also for their extraordinary beauty. The New York Times declared in 1862 that “as specimens of the photographic art they are unequaled.”

Watkins’s album Photographs of the Yosemite Valley is sequenced to replicate the experience of entering the Mariposa Grove trail and traveling into the valley. From Cathedral Rocks to Half Dome, Watkins captures the quiet majesty of Yosemite’s natural monuments. The album contains images from both his initial expedition in 1861 and a subsequent visit as an ad hoc member of the California State Geological Survey team in 1865-66. Throughout his career, Watkins maintained close relationships with geologists as well as botanists who were deeply interested in his documentation of native tree species.

In Yosemite, Watkins found a spectacular natural laboratory for testing and refining his approach to landscape photography. His compositional choices were unique. In The Yosemite Valley from the “Best General View” (1866), for instance, Watkins cropped off the top of the lone tree in the foreground instead of framing it, lending a painterly quality to the image. By manipulating focus and perspective, Watkins also achieved an unusual balance of crispness against softer tonalities.

Watkins’s technical achievements under adverse conditions were unmatched and astonished his peers. The resolution of his photographs still rivals that of the high-end digital cameras of today. After 1861, capitalising on the success of his Yosemite pictures and his reputation as a landscape photographer, Watkins renamed his studio at 425 Montgomery Street in San Francisco the “Yo-Semite Gallery.” The exhibition features more than 30 photographs from the album Photographs of the Yosemite Valley including various views of Yosemite Valley; mountains and rock formations such as Cathedral Rocks, Half Dome, and El Capitan; waterfalls and water views such as Mirror Lake and Yosemite Falls; and photographs of Yosemite’s majestic trees.

 

Photographs of the Pacific Coast (1862-1876)

Watkins made his living mostly as a field photographer for hire, accepting commissions from logging companies and mining operations up and down the coast. Early in his career, Watkins’s photographs were often used to attract investors or as documentation in court evidence for land disputes. In the fast-developing West, photography was a means of establishing ‘truth claims’ to property and resource rights. And in a region where vast swaths of territory were rarely traveled by city dwellers, photography filled in the gaps.

Watkins added images from these underwritten trips to an album he called Photographs of the Pacific Coast. Along with his commercial photographs of smelting works at the New Almaden Mine in Santa Clara County and the hydraulic North Bloomfield mine in Nevada County, the album contains remarkable vistas of San Francisco including a dramatic photograph of the shipwreck Viscata on Ocean Beach, also images of the Devil’s Canyon geysers in Sonoma County and the Farallon Islands.

The album also includes images commissioned by California’s sixth governor, Milton Slocum Latham, of Latham’s mansion on San Francisco’s Rincon Hill. It was, in fact, Latham’s wife, Mollie, who commissioned the three albums now at Stanford. One of the original bindings is on display so visitors can appreciate its massive size and ornate details. With the Civil War raging in the eastern part of the country until 1865, Watkins’s images of the pristine Pacific Coast must have provided Americans a welcome alternative to the images of carnage issuing from the battlefield.

In the exhibition, there are more than 20 California photographs from the album Photographs of the Pacific Coast including scenes of San Francisco neighbourhoods, homes, and natural sites including the Farallon Islands; commissioned images of mining operations; and views of Mt. Shasta, Mendocino County, and Sonoma County.

 

Photographs of the Columbia River and Oregon (1867 and 1870)

While Watkins’s name is most closely associated with Yosemite, photographers often cite Watkins’s album Photographs of the Columbia River and Oregon as his crowning artistic achievement. No longer a novice, Watkins demonstrates mastery of his craft and a keen eye for composition in these images. A friend at the Oregon Steam Navigation Company arranged for Watkins to travel by rail up and down the Columbia River to photograph the company’s rail portages and scenic beauty to document the company’s progress. Watkins was the first to photograph this area and traveled for four months to do so.

In the resulting views of Portland, Oregon City, rail portages, river industry, and scenery, Watkins made art of the river landscapes and the railroad laid alongside it. Cape Horn, Near Celilo (1867), taken at the final point of his journey where the tracks ended, shows a stark horizon, suggesting both the far edge of the world and the determination of early industrial pioneers. In Mt. Hood and the Dalles, Columbia River (1867), a spectacular view of Mt. Hood and of the meandering river at the base of basalt cliffs is disrupted by the object of greatest focus – a tiny white outbuilding for the railroad.

The exhibition features more than 15 photographs from the album Photographs of the Columbia River and Oregon including views along the Columbia River of Cape Horn, Castle Rock and Mt. Hood; and images of Portland, Oregon City, and smaller towns and industries along the railroad.

 

Exploring Watkins’s Photographs with Digital Technology

Stanford’s Center for Spatial and Textual Analysis, the Bill Lane Center for the American West, the Branner Earth Sciences Library, and the Cantor worked together to create an innovative cartographic digital accompaniment for each album.

For Photographs of Yosemite Valley, the team – including select students – generated “viewsheds” of several of Watkins’s photographs that enable visitors to see where each was likely taken and what topographical elements are either illuminated or obscured in them. With Photographs of the Pacific Coast, fascinating before-and-after visualisations illustrate the incredible changes in the landscape of San Francisco over the last century and a half. Lastly, a cartographic accompaniment to Photographs of the Columbia River and Oregon details the early railroad routes Watkins traveled to take his photographs.

 

Carleton Eugene Watkins (1829-1916)

Born in upstate New York in 1829, Watkins ventured west to look for opportunities and settled in the Bay Area in 1852. While working for a photography studio, he was asked to step in for a photographer who had unexpectedly quit. Watkins quickly learned the daguerreotype process and within two years he was making ambrotypes and wet-plate collodion photographs.

Throughout his career, Watkins documented the remote American West, generating more than 7,000 photographs of its most majestic wilderness sites as well as the dramatic transformation of isolated territories caused by logging and mining industries. His photographs won awards throughout the United States and abroad. With his early success, he established a gallery in San Francisco on prestigious Montgomery Street in 1861.

But Watkins’s fortunes took a turn with the 1874 failure of the Bank of California and the resulting economic panic. Heavily in debt at the time, Watkins had to declare bankruptcy and lost both the gallery and the majority of his negatives to a competitor. Watkins rebuilt his inventory, continuing to travel and work into the 1890s, but never recovered financially. At one point he and his family lived in a rail car in Oakland. Watkins’s health also declined, and by 1903 he was nearly blind. Watkins died tragically. The 1906 earthquake and fire destroyed his studio and his life’s work, and he never got over the shock. His family eventually had him committed to Napa State Hospital. He died there in 1916.

Press release from the Cantor Arts Center website

 

Carleton Watkins (U.S.A., 1829-1916) 'Cape Horn, Columbia River' 1867

 

Carleton Watkins (American, 1829-1916)
Cape Horn, Columbia River
1867
From the album Photographs of the Columbia River and Oregon
Albumen print
Lent by Department of Special Collections, Stanford University Libraries

 

Carleton Watkins (U.S.A., 1829-1916) 'Arch at the West End, Farallones' 1868-1869

 

Carleton Watkins (American, 1829-1916)
Arch at the West End, Farallones
1868-1869
From the album Photographs of the Pacific Coast
Albumen print
Lent by Department of Special Collections, Stanford University Libraries

 

Carleton Watkins (U.S.A., 1829-1916) 'Multnomah Falls, Columbia River, Oregon' 1867

 

Carleton Watkins (American, 1829-1916)
Multnomah Falls, Columbia River, Oregon
1867
From the album Photographs of the Columbia River and Oregon
Albumen print
Lent by Department of Special Collections, Stanford University Libraries

 

Carleton Watkins (U.S.A., 1829-1916) 'Multnomah Falls, Cascades, Columbia River' 1867

 

Carleton Watkins (American, 1829-1916)
Multnomah Falls, Cascades, Columbia River
1867
From the album Photographs of the Columbia River and Oregon
Albumen print
Lent by Department of Special Collections, Stanford University Libraries

 

Carleton Watkins (U.S.A., 1829-1916) 'Pohono, the Bridal Veil, Yosemite 900 ft.' 1865-1866

 

Carleton Watkins (American, 1829-1916)
Pohono, the Bridal Veil, Yosemite 900 ft.
1865-1866
From the album Photographs of the Yosemite Valley
Albumen print
Lent by Department of Special Collections, Stanford University Libraries

 

Carleton Watkins (U.S.A., 1829-1916) 'The Lower Yosemite Fall, Yosemite' 1865-1866

 

Carleton Watkins (American, 1829-1916)
The Lower Yosemite Fall, Yosemite
1865-1866
From the album Photographs of the Yosemite Valley
Albumen print
Lent by Department of Special Collections, Stanford University Libraries

 

Carleton Watkins (U.S.A., 1829-1916) 'The Yosemite Falls, 2634 ft.' 1865-1866

 

Carleton Watkins (American, 1829-1916)
The Yosemite Falls, 2634 ft.
1865-1866
From the album Photographs of the Yosemite Valley
Albumen print. Lent by Department of Special Collections, Stanford University Libraries

 

Carleton Watkins (U.S.A., 1829-1916) 'Mirror View of El Capitan, Yosemite' 1865-1866

 

Carleton Watkins (American, 1829-1916)
Mirror View of El Capitan, Yosemite
1865-1866
From the album Photographs of the Yosemite Valley
Albumen print
Lent by Department of Special Collections, Stanford University Libraries

 

Carleton Watkins (U.S.A., 1829-1916) 'Washington Column, 2082 ft., Yosemite' 1865-1866

 

Carleton Watkins (American, 1829-1916)
Washington Column, 2082 ft., Yosemite
1865-1866
From the album Photographs of the Yosemite Valley
Albumen print
Lent by Department of Special Collections, Stanford University Libraries

 

Carleton Watkins (U.S.A., 1829-1916) 'The Ponderosa, Yosemite' 1866

 

Carleton Watkins (American, 1829-1916)
The Ponderosa, Yosemite
1866
From the album Photographs of the Yosemite Valley
Albumen print
Lent by Department of Special Collections, Stanford University Libraries

 

Carleton Watkins (U.S.A., 1829-1916) 'Section of the Grizzly Giant, 33 ft. diameter' 1865-1866

 

Carleton Watkins (American, 1829-1916)
Section of the Grizzly Giant, 33 ft. diameter
1865-1866
From the album Photographs of the Yosemite Valley
Albumen print. Lent by Department of Special Collections, Stanford University Libraries

 

 

Cantor Arts Center at Stanford University
328 Lomita Drive at Museum Way
Stanford, CA 94305-5060
Phone: 650-723-4177

Opening hours:
Wednesday – Sunday 11am – 5pm
Closed Monday and Tuesday

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Exhibition: ‘Abelardo Morell: The Universe Next Door’ at the J. Paul Getty Museum, Getty Center, Los Angeles

Exhibition dates: 1st October 2013 – 5th January 2014

 

Abelardo Morell (American, born Cuba, 1948) 'Paper Bag' 1992

 

Abelardo Morell (American born Cuba, b. 1948)
Paper Bag
1992
Inkjet print
Image: 57.2 x 45.7cm (22 1/2 x 18 in.)
Courtesy of the artist and Edwynn Houk Gallery, New York
© Abelardo Morell, courtesy of Edwynn Houk Gallery, New York

 

 

The J. Paul Getty Museum puts on some amazing exhibitions, and this is no exception. For me the strength of this artist lies in his black and white work. I am not so enamoured with the camera obscura, unexpected juxtapositions of objects or tent-camera images. They seem prosaic and lack the magic of the black and white work.

The artist’s distinctive take on domestic interiors and family life is beguiling. Damp footprints on a bathroom floor with the most glorious light; the dark maw of a open paper bag; toy blocks ascending skywards; jumble of letters on a monolithic refrigerator door; the shadow of a house made into a house (amazing!); and the portents of darkness to come as Brady looks at his shadow. You cannot forget these images, they impinge on your consciousness. As for the colour images, they seem insignificant, superfluous when compared with these resonances.

Marcus

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Many thankx to the J. Paul Getty Museum for allowing me to publish the photographs in the posting. Please click on the photographs for a larger version of the image.

 

 

Abelardo Morell (American, born Cuba, 1948) 'Curiouser and Curiouser' 1998

 

Abelardo Morell (American born Cuba, b. 1948)
Curiouser and Curiouser
1998
Inkjet print
Image: 57.2 x 45.7cm (22 1/2 x 18 in.)
Courtesy of the artist and Edwynn Houk Gallery, New York
© Abelardo Morell, courtesy of Edwynn Houk Gallery, New York

 

Abelardo Morell (American, born Cuba, 1948) 'Lisa and Brady Behind Glass' 1986

 

Abelardo Morell (American born Cuba, b. 1948)
Lisa and Brady Behind Glass
1986
Inkjet print
Image: 57.2 x 45.7cm (22 1/2 x 18 in.)
Courtesy of the artist and Edwynn Houk Gallery, New York
© Abelardo Morell, courtesy of Edwynn Houk Gallery, New York

 

Abelardo Morell (American, born Cuba, 1948) 'Toy Blocks' 1987

 

Abelardo Morell (American born Cuba, b. 1948)
Toy Blocks
1987
Inkjet print
Image: 57.2 x 45.7cm (22 1/2 x 18 in.)
Courtesy of the artist and Edwynn Houk Gallery, New York
© Abelardo Morell, courtesy of Edwynn Houk Gallery, New York

 

Abelardo Morell (American, born Cuba, 1948) 'Refrigerator' 1987

 

Abelardo Morell (American born Cuba, b. 1948)
Refrigerator
1987
Inkjet print
Image: 57.2 x 45.7cm (22 1/2 x 18 in.)
Courtesy of the artist and Edwynn Houk Gallery, New York
© Abelardo Morell, courtesy of Edwynn Houk Gallery, New York

 

Abelardo Morell (American, born Cuba, 1948) 'Footprints' 1987

 

Abelardo Morell (American born Cuba, b. 1948)
Footprints
1987
Inkjet print
Image: 57.2 x 45.7 cm (22 1/2 x 18 in.)
High Museum of Art, Atlanta, purchased with funds from the Friends of Photography
© Abelardo Morell, courtesy of Edwynn Houk Gallery, New York

 

Abelardo Morell (American, born Cuba, 1948) 'Laura and Brady in the Shadow of Our House' 1994

 

Abelardo Morell (American born Cuba, b. 1948)
Laura and Brady in the Shadow of Our House
1994
Gelatin silver print
Image: 45.7 x 57.2cm (18 x 22 1/2 in.)
The Art Institute of Chicago, gift of Abelardo Morell
© Abelardo Morell, courtesy of Edwynn Houk Gallery, New York

 

Abelardo Morell (American, born Cuba, 1948) 'Book of Revolving Stars' 1994

 

Abelardo Morell (American born Cuba, b. 1948)
Book of Revolving Stars
1994
Inkjet print
Image: 45.7 x 57.2cm (18 x 22 1/2 in.)
Courtesy of the artist and Edwynn Houk Gallery, New York
© Abelardo Morell, courtesy of Edwynn Houk Gallery, New York

 

Abelardo Morell. 'Light Bulb' 1991

 

Abelardo Morell (American born Cuba, b. 1948)
Light Bulb
1991
Gelatin silver print
Image: 45.7 x 57.2cm (18 x 22 1/2 in.)
The Art Institute of Chicago, Comer Foundation Fund, 1994.40
© Abelardo Morell, courtesy of Edwynn Houk Gallery, New York

 

Abelardo Morell. 'Camera Obscura: Houses Across the Street in Our Bedroom, Quincy, MA' 1991

 

Abelardo Morell (American born Cuba, b. 1948)
Camera Obscura: Houses Across the Street in Our Bedroom, Quincy, MA
1991
Gelatin silver print
Image: 79.2 x 103.2 cm (31 3/16 x 40 5/8 in.)
The J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles, promised gift of Daniel Greenberg and Susan Steinhauser
© Abelardo Morell, courtesy of Edwynn Houk Gallery, New York

 

Abelardo Morell. 'Two Forks Under Water' 1993

 

Abelardo Morell (American born Cuba, b. 1948)
Two Forks Under Water
1993
Inkjet print
Image: 57.2 x 45.7cm (22 1/2 x 18 in.)
Courtesy of the artist and Edwynn Houk Gallery, New York
© Abelardo Morell, courtesy of Edwynn Houk Gallery, New York

 

Abelardo Morell. 'Book with Wavy Pages' 2001

 

Abelardo Morell (American born Cuba, b. 1948)
Book with Wavy Pages
2001
Gelatin silver print
Image: 57.2 x 45.7cm (22 1/2 x 18 in.)
Lent by the artist, courtesy Edwynn Houk Gallery, New York
© Abelardo Morell, courtesy of Edwynn Houk Gallery, New York

 

Abelardo Morell. 'Motion Study of Falling Pitchers' 2004

 

Abelardo Morell (American born Cuba, b. 1948)
Motion Study of Falling Pitchers
2004
Gelatin silver print
Image: 57.2 x 45.7cm (22 1/2 x 18 in.)
The Art Institute of Chicago, promised gift of Daniel Greenberg and Susan Steinhauser
© Abelardo Morell, courtesy of Edwynn Houk Gallery, New York

 

Abelardo Morell. 'Brady Looking at his Shadow' 1991

 

Abelardo Morell (American born Cuba, b. 1948)
Brady Looking at his Shadow
1991
Inkjet print
Image: 57.2 x 45.7cm (22 1/2 x 18 in.)
High Museum of Art, Atlanta, purchased with funds from Bert and Cathy Clark
© Abelardo Morell, courtesy of Edwynn Houk Gallery, New York

 

 

Over the past 25 years, Abelardo Morell (American, born Cuba, 1948) has become internationally renowned for photographs that push the boundaries of the medium while exploring visual surprise and wonder. Throughout his career, he has looked at things with a fresh vision and investigated simple optics in myriad forms. Abelardo Morell: The Universe Next Door, on view October 1, 2013 – January 5, 2014 at the J. Paul Getty Museum, Getty Center, traces the artist’s innovative work as he has continued to mine the essential strangeness and complexity of photography. The exhibition was organised by The Art Institute of Chicago, in association with the J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles, and the High Museum of Art, Atlanta.

“Abelardo Morell is one of this country’s great contemporary photographers whose very distinctive achievement is celebrated in this first major survey of his work,” explains Timothy Potts, director of the J. Paul Getty Museum. “The exhibition also celebrates the growth of the holdings of Morell at three major museums, which have recently been augmented through the generosity of Dan Greenberg and Susan Steinhauser, who have promised significant groups of works by the artist to each institution’s permanent collection.”

Morell came to the United States as a teenager. He attended Bowdoin College in Maine, and later completed an MFA in photography at Yale University. In 1986 he began creating large-format pictures around his home, examining common household objects with childlike curiosity. As a professor at the Massachusetts College of Art and Design, he experimented with optics in his teaching and initiated a series of images in which he turned entire rooms into camera obscuras, capturing the outside world as projected onto interior surfaces. These visual experiments and endless exploration of the medium are at the heart of the work on view in the exhibition.

 

From a Child’s Perspective

The earliest photographs in the exhibition date from the mid-1980s, when the birth of his son, Brady, led Morell to a radical shift in his work. Looking inward at his own family life, Morell found novel subject matter in domestic interiors. He set aside his hand-held camera in favor of a large-format view camera that necessitated a more deliberate style and elicited a wealth of tactile detail from his subjects. Of this shift, Morell writes: “I started making photographs as if I were a child myself. This strategy got me to look at things around me more closely, more slowly, and from vantage points I hadn’t considered before.” This technique can be seen in Refrigerator (negative, 1987; print, 2012), where Morell portrays a common refrigerator as a giant monolith with jumbled letters on it, evoking the preverbal vision of a child. This concept recurs in Toy Blocks (negative, 1987; print, 2012), where toy blocks photographed from a steep perspective on the floor are made to seem like a mysterious Tower of Babel, as they might to a small child.

 

Camera Obscura Experiments

The basis for all photography, the principle of the camera obscura (Latin for “dark chamber”) has been known since antiquity. In 1991, Morell began transforming entire rooms into cameras by covering the windows and inserting a small hole. He used a second camera to photograph the superimposition of the outside world as projected onto various interiors. Morell started by making black-and-white pictures in his own home before traveling before traveling in search of other compelling subjects for his uncanny, disorienting images. Morell made a pilgrimage to photograph Lacock Abbey, the country house of William Henry Fox Talbot (British, 1800-1877), one of the inventors of photography. Talbot’s era was an ideal model for the camera obscura work, as the general interest in a variety of intersecting subject matter at that time mirrored Morell’s own interest in uniting science, art, philosophy, and religion.

In 2005, Morell turned to creating camera obscura works in colour, eventually incorporating technical refinements that made his photographs less raw and immediate and more explicitly constructed. In View of the Brooklyn Bridge in the Bedroom (2009), bold red sheets serve as a reminder of the bed as a site of intimacy, contrasting with the public space of the Brooklyn Bridge. This strange juxtaposition also evokes a dreamlike state, as the outdoor image floats just above the bed.

 

Tent Camera Images

In 2010, following the example of 19th century photographers such as Carleton Watkins (American, 1829-1916) and William Henry Jackson (American, 1843-1942), Morell set out to capture the grandeur of the American wilderness. At Big Bend National Park in Texas, he began experimenting with a portable tent camera featuring a periscope lens on top, which projected the scene outside onto the ground. Morell found it appealing that what was overlooked because it was underfoot – something so common and shared – formed the backdrop for these images. In Tent Camera Image on Ground: El Capitan from Cathedral Beach, Yosemite National Park, California (2012), Morell followed Carleton Watkins’s path into Yosemite, where he used the tent camera to create a landscape that is no longer fresh and pristine, but set against such modern visual disruptions as bike tracks in the dirt.

 

Additional Experiments

Also on view in the exhibition are additional visual experiments employed by Morell, including a simulation of Eadweard Muybridge’s early use of stop-motion using a water pitcher and wine glass, as well as optical curiosities like dappled sunlight under trees, which Morell said results from hundreds of “tiny cameras” that form in the minute spaces between leaves. While in residence at two museums – the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in Boston in 1998, and the Yale University Art Gallery in New Haven in 2008 – Morell created photographs that involve unexpected juxtapositions that explore how the presentation of art affects its meaning. By moving sculptures and paintings in close proximity to one another, he created what he called “an impossible conversation” between works of art. In Nadelman / Hopper (negative, 2008; print, 2012), he positioned a bust by Elie Nadelman (American, 1882-1946) in front of a painting by Edward Hopper (American, 1882-1967) for a composition in the vein of Surrealist painter Giorgio de Chirico (Italian, 1888-1978).

“Morell is driven by his unflagging intellectual curiosity and his love of the medium of photography,” said Paul Martineau, associate curator of photographs and curator of the exhibition at the Getty Museum. “His work is grounded in the past, but it also contains an unexpected twist that causes us to reexamine what we think we know. I am delighted to be able to share this unique collection of photographs with our visitors.”

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Abelardo Morell: The Universe Next Door is on view October 1, 2013 – January 5, 2014 at the J. Paul Getty Museum, Getty Center. The exhibition was on view at the the Art Institute of Chicago from June 1 – September 2, 2013, and will be on view at the High Museum of Art, Atlanta from February 22 – May 18, 2014. The exhibition is curated by Paul Martineau, associate curator in the Department of Photographs at the J. Paul Getty Museum, Elizabeth Siegel, associate curator of photography at the Art Institute of Chicago, and Brett Abbott, curator of photography at the High Museum of Art, Atlanta, where it travels after the Getty. Funding for the exhibition catalogue was provided by the Robert Mapplethorpe Foundation. Generous in-kind support for the exhibition was provided by Tru Vue Inc. and Gemini Moulding Incc.

Press release from the J. Paul Getty Museum website

 

Abelardo Morell. 'Nadelman/Hopper, Yale University Art Gallery' 2008

 

Abelardo Morell (American born Cuba, b. 1948)
Nadelman/Hopper, Yale University Art Gallery
2008
Inkjet print
Image: 61 x 76.2cm (24 x 30 in.)
Courtesy of Bonni Benrubi Gallery, New York
© Abelardo Morell, courtesy of Edwynn Houk Gallery, New York

 

Abelardo Morell. 'Tent-Camera Image On Ground: Rooftop View Of The Brooklyn Bridge' 2010

 

Abelardo Morell (American born Cuba, b. 1948)
Tent-Camera Image On Ground: Rooftop View Of The Brooklyn Bridge
2010
Inkjet print
Image: 76.2 x 101.6cm (30 x 40 in.)
Courtesy of the artist and Edwynn Houk Gallery, New York
© Abelardo Morell, courtesy of Edwynn Houk Gallery, New York

 

Abelardo Morell. 'Tent-Camera Image on Ground: View of the Golden Gate Bridge from Battery Yates' 2012

 

Abelardo Morell (American born Cuba, b. 1948)
Tent-Camera Image on Ground: View of the Golden Gate Bridge from Battery Yates
2012
Inkjet print
Image: 57.2 x 76.2cm (22 1/2 x 30 in.)
Courtesy of the artist and Edwynn Houk Gallery, New York
© Abelardo Morell, courtesy of Edwynn Houk Gallery, New York

 

Abelardo Morell. 'Tent-Camera Image on Ground: View of the Grand Canyon from Trailview Overlook' 2012

 

Abelardo Morell (American born Cuba, b. 1948)
Tent-Camera Image on Ground: View of the Grand Canyon from Trailview Overlook
2012
Inkjet print
Image: 57.2 x 76.2cm (22 1/2 x 30 in.)
Courtesy of Bonni Benrubi Gallery, New York
© Abelardo Morell, courtesy of Edwynn Houk Gallery, New York

 

Abelardo Morell. 'Tent-Camera Image on Ground: View of the Yosemite Valley from Tunnel View' 2012

 

Abelardo Morell (American born Cuba, b. 1948)
Tent-Camera Image on Ground: View of the Yosemite Valley from Tunnel View
2012
Inkjet print
Image: 57.2 x 76.2cm (22 1/2 x 30 in.)
Courtesy of the artist and Edwynn Houk Gallery, New York
© Abelardo Morell, courtesy of Edwynn Houk Gallery, New York

 

Abelardo Morell. 'Upright Camera Obscura Image of the Piazzeta San Marco Looking Southeast in Office' 2007

 

Abelardo Morell (American born Cuba, b. 1948)
Upright Camera Obscura Image of the Piazzeta San Marco Looking Southeast in Office
2007
Inkjet print
Image: 61 x 76.2cm (24 x 30 in.)
The Art Institute of Chicago, gift of the artist in memory of David Feingold, 2013.1
© Abelardo Morell, courtesy of Edwynn Houk Gallery, New York

 

Abelardo Morell. 'Camera Obscura: View of the Brooklyn Bridge in Bedroom' 2009

 

Abelardo Morell (American born Cuba, b. 1948)
Camera Obscura: View of the Brooklyn Bridge in Bedroom
2009
Inkjet print
Image: 79 x 101.6cm (31 1/8 x 40 in.)
The J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles, Purchased with funds provided by Richard and Alison Crowell, Daniel Greenberg and Susan Steinhauser and anonymous donors in honour of James N. Wood
© Abelardo Morell, courtesy of Edwynn Houk Gallery, New York

 

Abelardo Morell. 'Camera Obscura Image of Santa Maria della Salute in Palazzo Bedroom, Venice, Italy' 2006

 

Abelardo Morell (American born Cuba, b. 1948)
Camera Obscura Image of Santa Maria della Salute in Palazzo Bedroom, Venice, Italy
2006
Inkjet print
Image: 101.6 x 76.2cm (40 x 30 in.)
Lent by the artist, courtesy Edwynn Houk Gallery, New York
© Abelardo Morell, courtesy of Edwynn Houk Gallery, New York

 

 

The J. Paul Getty Museum
1200 Getty Center Drive
Los Angeles, California 90049

Opening hours:
Tuesday – Friday 10am – 5.30pm
Saturday 10 am – 9pm
Sunday 10am – 5.30pm
Monday closed

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Exhibition: ‘Dialogue among Giants: Carleton Watkins and the Rise of Photography in California’ at the J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles

Exhibition dates: 14th October 2008 – 1st March 2009

 

Unknown maker, American, Attributed to Carleton Watkins (American, 1829-1916) 'The Plaza, Lima, Peru' About 1852

 

Unknown maker, American, Attributed to Carleton Watkins (American, 1829-1916)
The Plaza, Lima, Peru
About 1852
Daguerreotype
Plate: 10.8 × 14cm (4 1/4 × 5 1/2 in.)
J. Paul Getty Museum Collection

 

Watkins could have made this study of the Lima Cathedral on his return to California from New York via South America in 1852.

 

 

Carleton Watkins was a master photographer, craftsman, technician and, above all, a refined artist. The structural cadences of his compositions, like the best music, are superb. Within his photographs he creates a visual dialogue that sustains pertinent inquiry by the viewer – the look! see! – that has lasted centuries, as all great art does. Today his photographs are as clearly seen, as incisive of mind, as when they were first produced. They delight.

From the documentary photographs of mining settlements to the images of Yosemite; from the stereographs of cities to the gardens of the rich and famous; from the photographs of untouched interior America to the images of the Monterey Peninsula Watkins photographs are sharply observed renditions of a reality placed before the lens of his giant plate camera.

Like all great artists his eye is unique. His use angle, height and placement of the camera is reinforced by his understanding of the balance of light and shade, the construction of planes within the image and the spatial relationships that could be achieved within the frame (at the same time we note that the artist Cezanne was also investigating the deconstruction of traditional landscape perspectives within the image frame). His work reminds me of the photographs of the great French photographer Eugene Atget: both men understood how best to place the camera to achieve the outcome they wanted so that the photographs became imprinted with their signature, images that nobody else could have taken. Today we recognise both men as masters of photography for this very fact. The images they took raise them above the rank and file photographer because of the care and understanding they took in the decisions they made in the exposure of the negative.

As a precursor to modernism in photography Watkins does not have peer at this time. His photographs preempt the 20th century modernist work of Paul Strand and Alfred Stieglitz, his Monterey and Yosemite photographs the work of Edward Weston and Ansel Adams, and in his Japanese influences the work of Minor White. Even today at the exhibition by Andreas Gursky at the National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne there is a colour work of a body of water (see below: Rhein 1996) that closely reflects the structure of Watkins View on the Calloway Canal, near Poso Creek, Kern County 1887, even though the subject matter of Gursky’s image is a simulacra of an implied reality, whereas Watkins work “served as evidence in a water rights lawsuit that eventually resulted in a decisive court ruling that prevented newcomers from diverting water from existing landowners.”1

Watkins cadence as a sentient being will endure in the choices he made in the photographs he exposed. His tempo, his innate ability to place the camera, his understanding of the light and shade, texture, environment, depth of field and feeling make this artist one that all aspiring artists – no, all human beings – should study.

Dr Marcus Bunyan

 

  1. For more information about this image please see the J. Paul Getty Museum web page.

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Many thankx to the J. Paul Getty Museum for allowing me to publish the photographs in the posting. Please click on the photographs for a larger version of the image.

 

Carleton Watkins (American, 1829-1916) (attributed) 'Placer Mining Scene' c. 1852-55

 

Carleton Watkins (American, 1829-1916) (attributed)
Placer Mining Scene
c. 1852-1855
Half-plate daguerreotype
4 x 5 in. (10.2 x 12.7cm)
J. Paul Getty Museum Collection

 

 

Watkins was persistently interested in the technical details of mining operations. Here a primitive Spanish ore mill is used to pulverise gold-bearing rock. Throughout his career Watkins earned income producing photographs that were used as sources for engraved illustrations, as this one was.

Text from the J. Paul Getty Museum website

 

Unknown maker, American, Attributed to Carleton Watkins (American, 1829-1916) 'Engineering Camp, Copiapo, Chile' about 1852-1855

 

Unknown maker, American, Attributed to Carleton Watkins (American, 1829-1916)
Engineering Camp, Copiapo, Chile
About 1852-1855
Daguerreotype
Plate: 10.8 × 14cm (4 1/4 × 5 1/2 in.)
J. Paul Getty Museum Collection

 

 

In 1852 Watkins went to New York, then returned to California the following spring aboard the SS Michael Angelo, which was loaded with tons of supplies destined for mining camps on the Pacific Coast of the Americas. The vessel proceeded to the port of Caldera, Chile, where goods destined for the mines at Copiapó were unloaded. Miners and their various forms of shelter, such as the tent shown here in the landscape, were among Watkins’s favourite subjects.

Text from the J. Paul Getty Museum website

 

Carleton Watkins (American, 1829-1916), Robert H. Vance (American, 1825-1876) 'Street Scene in La Rancheria, California' 1853-1855

 

Carleton Watkins (American, 1829-1916), Robert H. Vance (American, 1825-1876)
Street Scene in La Rancheria, California
1853-1855
Daguerreotype, hand-coloured
8.3 × 11.4cm (3 1/4 × 4 1/2 in.)
J. Paul Getty Museum Collection

 

 

The mining camp of La Rancherie was located near the fabled Sutter’s Mill in California, where gold was discovered in 1849. In the volatile gold-rush environment of prospectors, get-rich-quick dreams, and fly-by-night towns, an assembly of men in the foreground stood for the camera to immortalise their roles in the historical moment. La Rancherie stood out for its stability: it could boast a few buildings made of clapboard and some that were even painted. The illustrated hotel sign at upper left indicates a clientele that was not entirely literate and might rely on pictures to identify potential lodgings.

Text from the J. Paul Getty Museum website

 

Carleton Watkins (American, 1829-1916) '[Section Grizzly Giant, Mariposa Grove]' 1861

 

Carleton Watkins (American, 1829-1916)
[Section Grizzly Giant, Mariposa Grove]
1861
Albumen silver print
43.2 × 52.1cm (17 × 20 1/2 in.)
J. Paul Getty Museum Collection

 

 

Galen Clark, the figure in this photograph, was designated as the guardian of the Mariposa Grove of giant sequoia about the time Abraham Lincoln ceded it to California in 1864. When this picture was made, Clark lived in a cabin (not pictured) nearby and maintained a rustic way station for visitors traveling to Yosemite Valley via the Mariposa Trail, which was developed in 1859.

Text from the J. Paul Getty Museum website

 

Carleton Watkins. 'Yosemite Valley from the Best General View No.2.' 1866

 

Carleton Watkins (American, 1829-1916)
Yosemite Valley from the Best General View No.2
1866
Albumen silver print
41 x 52.2cm (16 1/8 x 20 9/16 in.)
J. Paul Getty Museum Collection

 

 

Carleton Watkins had the ability to photograph a subject from the viewpoint that allowed the most information to be revealed about its contents. In this image, he captured what he considered the best features of Yosemite Valley: Bridalveil Falls, Cathedral Rock, Half Dome, and El Capitan. By positioning the camera so that the base of the slender tree appears to grow from the bottom edge of the picture, Watkins composed the photograph so that the canyon rim and the open space beyond it seem to intersect. Although he sacrificed the top of the tree, he was able to place the miniaturised Yosemite Falls at the visual centre of the picture. To alleviate the monotony of an empty sky, he added the clouds from a second negative. This image was taken while Watkins was working for the California Geological Survey. His two thousand pounds of equipment for the expedition, which included enough glass for over a hundred negatives, required a train of six mules.

Text from the J. Paul Getty Museum website

 

Carleton Watkins (American, 1829-1916) 'Further Up the Valley. The Three Brothers, the highest, 3,830 ft.' 1866

 

Carleton Watkins (American, 1829-1916)
Further Up the Valley. The Three Brothers, the highest, 3,830 ft.
1866
Albumen silver print
39.2 × 53.5cm (15 7/16 × 21 1/16 in.)
J. Paul Getty Museum Collection

 

 

In 1850, at the age of 20, Carleton Watkins is believed to have arrived in California from New York via South America. He embarked on a life in photography that began auspiciously during the gold rush (which started in 1849) and ended abruptly with the 1906 San Francisco earthquake and fire that destroyed his negatives. In between those historic moments, Watkins witnessed an era in which a recurring theme was the enormity of all things in the West. He photographed the expansive western landscape with its miles of coastline, vast natural resources, colossal trees, and the monoliths of the Yosemite Valley using an oversize mammoth-plate camera.

In the 1860s Watkins’s Yosemite photographs brought him fame from as far away as Paris, but a decade later he experienced a painful financial reversal. In the end, he died a pauper in 1916 after a life that brought him into dialogue with the many “giants” of his era. The photographs he left behind provide a unique personal vision of the birth and growth of California.

 

Mining Scenes and Daguerreotypes

After arriving in Sacramento in 1850, Watkins worked delivering supplies to the mines during the gold rush. As he traveled throughout the region, he applied his new photography skills by making daguerreotypes (an early photographic technique using silver-coated, polished copper plates). In 1852, he is believed to have taken up photography full time, making daguerreotypes as a freelance “outdoor man” for established studios in Sacramento, Marysville, and San Francisco.

Among the most important photographs created in California before about 1855 are more than 100 daguerreotypes of buildings and landscapes, the majority of which have not been attributed. Many represent the San Francisco Bay Area and the mother lode regions northeast of Sacramento, where Watkins lived from 1850 to 1853 – a fact that geographically positions him in the right place at the right time to have been their maker. This exhibition compares select daguerreotypes by unknown makers with securely identified photographs by Watkins. On the basis of style and other circumstantial evidence, it is possible that Watkins may have made many of the daguerreotypes.

 

Yosemite

Watkins first visited Yosemite Valley in the late 1850s and then returned to Yosemite several times in the 1860s and 1870s with a new mammoth-plate camera designed to expose collodion-on-glass negatives that were 18-by-22 inches in size. With this equipment, he created the pictures that soon brought him international fame.

Watkins was not the only photographer who made images of Yosemite. Charles L. Weed and Eadweard Muybridge both followed Watkins into Yosemite, and the photographers often re-created one another’s views. This exhibition explores the visual dialogue in Yosemite between Watkins, Weed, Muybridge, and the unidentified camera operator for Thomas Houseworth and Company, who may have actually been Watkins.

 

Pacific Coast

Watkins was best known for his photographs of Yosemite, but he also took his camera to the silver mines of Nevada and Arizona, and up and down the Pacific coast. Throughout his career he applied his understanding of the elements of landscape as art. His early work with mining subjects proved to be excellent training for his eventual vision of landscape as a powerful counterbalance to the fragility of human existence. He harnessed the elements of visual form – line, shape, mass, outline, perspective, viewpoint, and light – to enliven often static motifs in nature.

Watkins photographed the Monterey Peninsula in the 1880s, recording the scenery in a continuously unfolding progression along Seventeen-Mile Drive, which began and ended at the Hotel Del Monte. Near the hotel, Watkins created this image of a native cypress – windblown and with its roots exposed – clinging to the side of a rocky cliff. Many distinguished photographers, among them Edward Weston and Ansel Adams, followed Watkins over the years along this same stretch of coast, photographing similar subjects.

Anonymous. “Dialogue among Giants: Carleton Watkins and the Rise of Photography in California,” on the J. Paul Getty Museum website 2008 [Online] Cited 09/06/2022

 

Carleton Watkins (American, 1829-1916) 'Cape Horn, Columbia River, Oregon' Negative 1867; print about 1881-1883

 

Carleton Watkins (American, 1829-1916)
Cape Horn, Columbia River, Oregon
Negative 1867; print about 1881-1883
Albumen silver print
40.5 × 52.3cm (15 15/16 × 20 9/16 in.)
J. Paul Getty Museum Collection

 

 

In 1867 Carleton Watkins made an expedition to Oregon to obtain photographs of its geology, including the chain of extinct volcanic mountains that cap the coastal range. This view was made from the Washington side of the Columbia River. Even the evidence of a solitary boatman and his cargo does not disturb the landscape’s profound serenity, nor does his presence reveal the fact that cultivated farmland and an apple orchard existed nearby. Watkins’s image nonetheless portrays a man facing nature at its most grand and overwhelming. The man’s boat appears ready to launch into the still, glassy river, an act that will make an indelible imprint on the water’s pristine, boundless surface.

Text from the J. Paul Getty Museum website

 

Carleton Watkins (American, 1829-1916) '[Sugarloaf Islands at Fisherman's Bay, Farallon Islands]' About 1869

 

Carleton Watkins (American, 1829-1916)
[Sugarloaf Islands at Fisherman’s Bay, Farallon Islands]
About 1869
Albumen silver print
41 × 54.3cm (16 1/8 × 21 3/8 in.)
J. Paul Getty Museum Collection

 

 

Craggy rocks rise from a swirling, misty sea. Two seagulls punctuate the foreground, giving the scene a sense of scale. The uninhabited Sugarloaf Islands, part of the Farallon Island group, are located just north of San Francisco in the Pacific Ocean; in this photograph, they loom in the surf offshore like mysterious, petrified sea creatures. The length of the exposure softened the waves’ swirl into mist, adding to the impression of ancient, craggy mountaintops breaking through vaporous clouds.

Carleton Watkins frequently photographed the Farallon Islands. This particular area, the Gulf of the Farallones National Marine Sanctuary, includes 1,235 square miles of nearshore and offshore waters ranging from wetlands to deep-sea communities.

Text from the J. Paul Getty Museum website

 

Carleton Watkins (American, 1829-1916) 'View on Lake Tahoe' 1877

 

Carleton Watkins (American, 1829-1916)
View on Lake Tahoe
1877
Albumen silver print
40.3 × 52.7cm (15 7/8 × 20 3/4 in.)
J. Paul Getty Museum Collection

 

 

Standing between two sets of rails, Carleton Watkins photographed a busy pair of tracks above Carson Valley, Nevada. His shadow and that of his mammoth-plate camera indicate his precarious position on the steep grade in the foreground. A single engineer stands near the empty track curving around a mountain on the left, having already observed the train that heads away from the trestle on the right. Beneath these tracks, another steam engine pulling lumber on multiple flatbed cars makes its way around a sharp curve. The wood carried by these trains was an essential material for building the railroad and for operating steam engines. Lumber served as ties beneath the iron rails, telegraph poles lining the route, and fuel for wood-burning steam engines.

Text from the J. Paul Getty Museum website

 

Carleton Watkins (American, 1829-1916) 'Agassiz Rock and the Yosemite Falls, from Union Point' about 1878

 

Carleton Watkins (American, 1829-1916)
Agassiz Rock and the Yosemite Falls, from Union Point
about 1878
Albumen silver print
54.4 × 39.2cm (21 7/16 × 15 7/16 in.)
J. Paul Getty Museum Collection

 

Carleton Watkins (American, 1829-1916) '[Thompson's Seedless Grapes]' 1880

 

Carleton Watkins (American, 1829-1916)
[Thompson’s Seedless Grapes]
1880
Albumen silver print
37.6 × 55.7cm (14 13/16 × 21 15/16 in.)
J. Paul Getty Museum Collection

 

 

In this image celebrating Kern County’s agricultural bounty, Carleton Watkins clearly defined each fresh grape, tooth-edged leaf, and woody twig. Real estate developers successfully used photographs of lush fields, ripe produce, and plentiful harvests as a means of advertising to boost Southern California’s economy. The grape bunches hanging from the tendrils of this vine represent the earliest cultivation of seedless grapes.

Text from the J. Paul Getty Museum website

 

Carleton Watkins. "The Dalles, Extremes of High & Low Water, 92 ft" 1883

 

Carleton Watkins (American, 1829-1916)
The Dalles, Extremes of High & Low Water, 92 ft
1883
Albumen silver print
J. Paul Getty Museum Collection

 

 

At twenty, Carleton Watkins headed out to California to make his fortune. After working as a daguerreotype operator in San Jose, he established his own practice and soon made his first visit to the Yosemite Valley. There he made thirty mammoth plate and one hundred stereograph views that were among the first photographs of Yosemite seen in the East. Partly on the strength of Watkins’s photographs, President Abraham Lincoln signed the 1864 bill that declared the valley inviolable, thus paving the way for the National Parks system.

In 1865 Watkins became official photographer for the California State Geological Survey. He opened his own Yosemite Art Gallery in San Francisco two years later. The walls were lined with 18 x 22-inch prints in black walnut frames with gilt-edged mats. Such elegant presentation did not come cheap, and Watkins was accused of charging exorbitant prices. A poor businessman, he declared bankruptcy in 1874 and his negatives and gallery were sold to photographer Isaiah Taber, who began to publish Watkins’s images under his own name. Watkins, however, continued to photograph, and seven years later became manager of the Yosemite Art Gallery, then under different ownership. The San Francisco earthquake and fire of 1906 destroyed the contents of his studio, which he had intended to preserve at Stanford University.

Text from the J. Paul Getty Museum website

 

Eugène Atget (French, 1857-1927) 'Saint Cloud' 1904

 

Eugène Atget (French, 1857-1927)
Saint Cloud
1904
Albumen silver print

 

Carleton Watkins. "Cypress Tree at Point Lobos, Monterey County" 1883 - 1885

 

Carleton Watkins (American, 1829-1916)
Cypress Tree at Point Lobos, Monterey County
1883-1885
Albumen silver print
J. Paul Getty Museum Collection

 

Carleton Watkins. 'View on the Calloway Canal, near Poso Creek, Kern County' 1887

 

Carleton Watkins (American, 1829-1916)
View on the Calloway Canal, near Poso Creek, Kern County
1887
Albumen silver print
37.5 x 53cm (14 3/4 x 20 7/8 in.)
J. Paul Getty Museum Collection

 

 

The first photographs Watkins made along the Kern River served as evidence in a water rights lawsuit that eventually resulted in a decisive court ruling that prevented newcomers from diverting water from existing landowners. James Ben Ali Haggin, the defendant and Watkins’s client, had a series of irrigation canals that raised the price of land in Kern County. In this spare composition, made where present-day Poso Road crosses the Calloway Canal, Watkins devoted almost equal proportions to sky, land, and water.

Text from the J. Paul Getty Museum website

 

 

Andreas Gursky (German, b. 1955)
Rhein II
1996

 

 

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