Six American Documentary Photographers, 1890-1915 Tints & Drawings Galleries June 9/Julyl2The Metropolitan Museum of Art Jacob Riis Percy Byron Charles Currier Arnold Genthe Lewis Hine Frances Johnston Lewis Hine, "Newsboys in St. Louis," co. 1910. Lent by the National Committee (or the Employment of Youth • Six American Documentary Photographers, 1890-1915 Prints & Drawings Galleries June 9/July 12Tne Metropolitan Museum of Art Jacob Riis Percy Efyron Charles Currier Arnold Genthe Lewis Hine Frances Johnston m *-jQtfMi -- ^ •-• .. W] ^ ^^B ^d k^k^ji &4'% ** Bt "** fl " -A jJK*.j • ^K ^siW r J Lewis Hine, "New sboys in St. Lou s," ca. 1910. Lent by the N ational Committ se for the Employment of 1Youth The word "documentary" is used here with some reluctance for there is general agreement that photography has too long been burdened with labels and categories into which the most gifted photographers rarely fit. In place of "documentary" others have used "commercial", "journal­ istic", or "straight," words which connote photography that communicates directly rather than through posed or artificially contrived compositions. One of the questions suggested by this exhibition is whether we in the mid-twentieth century appreciate the photographs for the same reasons as the audience for whom they were created. We sense immedi­ ately that our pleasure in seeing a bygone age rendered in its myr­ iad details, albeit two dimensionally, and in black and white, is not far from the reaction contemporaries must have had in seeing aspects of life as remote to them as the whole era is to us. The general public probably had very little first hand experience with the slums of the Lower East Side; very few people would have seen the Hampton or Tuskegee Institutes; and the chance to see Elsie de Wolfe in her "cozy corner," or the oppor­ tunity to visit the practice room of the Metropolitan Opera House would have given the same delight to people then as it does today. Photographs then and now represent the chance to participate vicariously in situations remote in time and place. However, we did not select the photographs for their value as cultural artifacts, but rather desired that they stand up as photographs first. Some of these photographs have meaning for us that they didn't have originally. We speculate that the deadpan architectural interiors by Charles Currier would have been ignored, and Byron's New York views dismissed as banal if hung in Salon Exhibitions so popular around 1900. Time allows us to appreciate what might have been taken for granted at the turn of the century. We value in Currier's or Johnston's prints the re­ markable range of grays which modulate space and volume giving reso­ nance to even the most ordinary textures. On the other hand, aspects which were very important then are of much less interest today. For example, we find that the exploitation of children by employers was foremost in the mind of Lewis Hine. But since that social problem hardly exists today, thanks to the effectiveness of groups like tha National Child Labor Committee, it is Hine's personal vision that interests us more. We can venture one step further by saying that the context within which Hine or Riis found their subjects should have little effect on our opinion of the photographs. The photographers repre­ sented here exhibit the special capacity to depict commonplace subjects in a new way and to make the most remote subjects seem very close. If the quality of personal style which emerges in the other graphic arts through the individualizing nature of drawing is lacking in photo­ graphy, it is compensated for by the powerful effect the choice of the camera's viewpoint by the photographer has on the resulting photograph. Very subtle consistencies in point-of-view — for instance Hine's love of the closeup, Bryon's use of panorama, and Currier's preference for fron- tality — make it possible to distinguish between photographs which other­ wise have little pretense to personal style. A consistent and revealing view of environment on the part of the six photographers guided our selection of works from the substantial body of preserved photographs. If the need for selectivity, in this as in all group exhibitions, eliminates some aspects of an artists' work, we hope to gain in the exchange a more panoramic understanding of an earlier time. ********* We appreciate the generous assistance given us in preparing the exhibition by Phylis D. Massar and Ernst Halberstadt, who gave fully of their knowledge about photography. We are grateful to the following indi­ viduals and institutions for the loan of photographs: Albert K. Baragwanath, Senior Curator, Museum of the City of New York; Davis Pratt, Curator of Still Photography, Carpenter Center for Visual Arts, Harvard University; E. I. Cohen, Executive Secretary, National Committee on the Employment for Youth; and Beaumont Newhall, Director, George Eastman House, Rochester, New York. Weston Naef Curatorial Assistant Department of Prints and Photographs SIX AMERICAN DOCUMENTARY PHOTOGRAPHERS The Byron Company Joseph Byron, the son of an English photographer, operated a studio in England before coming to the United States in 1887. His son Percy showed in­ terest in photography very early and worked in the New York Studio from the age of 11. There is little doubt that coverage of the newsworthy events qf the City such as parties, weddings, parades, and funerals must have been a combined effort with little concern to distinguish between the work of father, son, and other assistants. While the firm existed until 1942, our selection is drawn from the studio's output before the First World War. Bibliography: Grace M. Mayer, Once Upon a City, New York, 1958. Lent by the Museum of the City of New York: 1. Hot Chestnut Vendor, 1903 2. Lamp Department of the George Borgfeldt Wholesale Store, 1909 3. Class in Drawing at the Studio of William M. Chase, 1896 4. The Dewey Parade, 1899 5. Elsie de Wolfe at home on 11th Street, 1896 6. Miss Huntington's Cooking School, 1903 7. Ballet Rehearsal at the Metropolitan Opera House, 1900 8. Street Vendors on Hester Street, 1898 9- Room Decorated in Oriental Taste, ca. 1896 CHARLES H. CURRIER (1851-1938) Currier was born into a family of artisans, the son of a marble and soap- stone worker, and the brother of the painter, J. Frank Currier. Charles Currier turned to photography at least by the mid-1880's as a middle aged man when he illustrated with photographs a book on the homes of Brookline, Massachusetts. Until 1889 he was proprietor of a jewelry shop and so must have practiced photo­ graphy on the side rather than as a full time pursuit. However for about twenty years after 1889, he operated a professional studio in Boston, where he specialized in architectural views and other commercial and industrial photography. About 300 negatives given by Ernst Halberstadt are preserved in the Library of Congress. Bibliography: Thomas H. Garver, Charles H, Currier: A Boston Photographer, Exhibition with catalog, Rose Art Museum, Brandeis University, March 15 - April 12, 1964 Lent by Ernst Halberstadt; numbers 10-18 are prints by Ernst Halberstadt from the original negatives made around 1900: 10. 421 Newbury Street, Boston 11. Four Hunters and their cabin 12. Institutional Kitchen 13- View from the cab of locomotive 1064 14. Teller's Cage 15- Lecture Room, Boston Dispensary 16. Men's Bath, possibly at Wayfarer's Lodge, Boston 17. The Bicycle Messengers 18. Laundry Room at Wayfarer's Lodge, Boston 19- /. G. Small & Co., Boston Original print by Charles Currier ARNOLD GENTHE (1869-1942) The son of a professor of Latin and Greek, Genthe emigrated from Germany to San Francisco about 1896 as a tutor. In 1897 he opened a portrait studio and soon became the most popular society photographer in the city. He eschewed formal poses and sought rather to capture the sitter in natural attitudes. His urge towards candidness carried Genthe into the streets of San Francisco's Chinatown which he recorded with great empathy. Perhaps Genthe's most spectacular a- chievement is his series of photographs on the earthquake and fire of 1906 which he took with a borrowed Kodak Brownie camera. Shortly after 1916 Genthe moved to New York City where he specialized in portraiture of actors, dancers and other celebrities. Many negatives of the portraits are preserved in the Library of Con­ gress. Bibliography: Arnold Genthe, As I Remember, New York, 1936; Will Irwin and Arnold Genthe, Old Chinatown, New York, 1923 20-22. Chinatown in San Francisco, ca. 1906 Gift of Mrs. Eustace Seligman 53.680.3,5,6 23. San Francisco after the Earthquake, 1906 Alfred Stieglitz Collection 33.43.223 24. The First Lights, San Francisco after the Earthquake, 1906 Alfred Stieglitz Collection 33-43.225 25. Tower of the Ages at the San Francisco Pan-Pacific International Exposition, 1915 Gift of Mrs. Robert Aitken 57.634.13 LEWIS HINE (1874-1940) Lewis Hine was born in Oshkosh, Wisconsin, in 1874, educated there and at the University of Chicago. He came to New York City in 1901 to teach Botany and Nature Studies at the Ethical Culture School, where in 1903 he began to use a camera as a teaching aid. Hine received a Master's Degree in Sociology from Columbia University in 1905, and continued to photograph, teach, and write until 1908 when he resigned his teaching post to photograph for the National Child Labor Committee, under whose auspices he executed many of the photographs exhibited here. In the 1920's he turned his camera on the industrial working man; how­ ever, by the 1930's his photography seemed old-fashioned, and his jobs were few, though he did some significant work for the Tennessee Valley Authority.