e
CENTER FOR CREATIVE PHOTOGRAPHY• UNIVERSITY OF ARIZONA RESEARCH SERIES NUMBER 23 JUNE 1986
LABYRINTHS: ESSAYS ON USING ARCHIVES
Contents
Director's Statement by James Enyeart 3
The Smoking Gun and Other Archival Fallacies by Amy Stark 4
Labyrinths by David L. Jacobs 16
Exhibitions 1982-1985 by Nancy Solomon 46
Acquisitions: January-June 1984 compiled by Judith Leckrone 49
The Center for Creative Photography is a research museum devoted to twentieth-century photography. Among its extensive collections arc complete archives of photographers who have made significant and creative contributions to the field. Each issue of the Center's research series, Tlie Archi,,e, is drawn from its extensive collections of photographs, manuscripts, and negatives; most issues include a plate section of facsimile reproductions. Subscribers to The Arc/1i111• also receive announcements of coming exhibitions and copies of the Center's collection guide series as they appear. Subscriptions mailed within the United States arc $25 for four issues of The Archive; foreign mailings arc $35. This represents a substantial discount from single copy rates, usually one-third to one-half price. To subscribe, send your check or money order to: Subscriptions, Center for Creative Photography, University of Arizona, 843 E. University Blvd., Tucson, Arizona 85719. Center for Creative Photography University of Arizona Copyright © 1986 Arizona Board of Regents All Rights Reserved
Ansel Adams letters © 1986 by the Trustees of the Ansel Adams Publishing Rights Trust All Rights Reserved Wynn Bullock letters © 1986 Wynn and Edna Bullock Trust Wynn Bullock negative index reproduced with the permission of Edna Bullock John Davenport poem is courtesy of David Higham Associates Andreas Feininger scrapbook© 1986 Andreas Feininger Sally McAlpin letter reproduced with permission of Mrs. Sally McAlpin Wayne Miller letter reproduced with permission of Wayne Miller Beaumont Newhall letter quoted with permission of Beaumont Newhall Nancy Newhall letters© 1986 Estate ofNancy Newhall Nancy Newhall article, "Controversy and the Creative Concept" in Aperture 2:2 (1953) © 1981 Trustees of Princeton University Publication of these quotations is courtesy of the Minor White Archive, Princeton University W. Eugene Smith letter and wall cabinet © 1986 The Heirs of W. Eugene Smith Edward Steichen letter reproduced with permission ofJoanna Steichen Alfred Stieglitz letter reproduced with permission of Georgia O'Keeffe Paul Strand scrapbook Copyright© Paul Strand Archive and Library, Aperture Foundation, Millerton, N.Y. Jerry Uelsmann negative file and cigars reproduced with permission ofJerry Uelsmann Minor White letters© 1986 Trustees of Princeton University Publication of these quotations is courtesy of the Minor White Archive, Princeton University The Archive, Research Series, of the Center for Creative Photography is supported in part by the Polaroid Corporation and the National Endowment for the Arts
Designed by Nancy Solomon Bembo Typography by Tiger Typographies Printed by Fabe Litho, Ltd. Bound by Roswell Bookbinding
COVER PHOTOGRAPH: Garry Winogrand: Esso Standard Oil Company, Baltimore Refinery, ca. 1955, © 1986 The Estate of Garry Winogrand. This contact sheet is part of the Garry Winogrand Collection donated to the Center in 1983 by Winogrand. The collection includes close to 400 contact sheets, 2700 fine prints, 13,000 work prints, and over 100 color prints and tear sheets from commercial assignments. Director)s Statement
by JAMES ENYEART
THE COLLECTIONS OF THE CENTER FOR CREATIVE PHO
feelings and aesthetic responses evoked by works of togra phy are divided into two categories: works of art. There is probably a greater risk of misunderstand art that we refer to as master prints and the archives, ing an artist by only studying the archives than by which contain study prints, proof prints, contact only experiencing his or her work.Faust Full appreciation sheets, negatives, correspondence, manuscripts, mem demands contact with both resources. orabilia, and any material considered germane to an Goethe expressed it well in when he wrote artist's life and method of working. The audience and "He who wishes to understand or describe anything patrons that utilize both aspects of the Center's collec first tries to expel the life. Then he has got the parts tions include artists, historians, critics, students, col in his hand. The only thing lacking is the spiritual lectors, and the general public. Each of these groups bond." In this case, the spiritual bond is the work of brings to the Center unique perspectives and interpre art, which over time gains a history of its own with tations according to its own background; yet all are out respect to the history and biography of the artist. subject to the same basic set of motivations and in The value of"taking the parts in one's hand" is in the spiration . They desire first-hand experience with art opportunity to provide a contextual environmentThe Archive that objects and wish to enhance their appreciation through will follow the work of art throughout its history. study. We are pleased to present in this issue of While it may be possible to appreciate works of art an essay by Dr. David Jacobs on the rewards and solely on the basis of intuition and an empirical sense frustrations of exploring archives from the research of quality, it is not likely that such appreciation will er's point of view. We are equally pleased to present expand beyond a personal level without in-depth study Amy Stark's essay on the same subject fromher point of history and biography. Such study represents an of view as the head archivist at the Center for Creative additional desire to synthesize life's experience with Photography.
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Enamel wall cabinet (66 x 12 x 26'') with writing by W. Eugene Smith: "Dearest People ! love you all, I really do, and that makes it all the more horrifying that I have dragged you into this excruciating [sic] situation made brutal by my own incompetence. Sincerely, the torture master of folly place." W. Eugene Smith Archive The Smoking Gun and Other Archival Fallacies
AMY STARK
by
ON THE OCCASION OF THE TENTH ANNIVERSARY EXHIBI
ports me to the woods of rural New York. This is tion of the Witkin Gallery, Lee Witkin wrote, the paradox of archival materials. As the material res idue of the past, it functions like theatrical scrim; Looking at the early Stieglitz, the handsome, now opaque, but in the right light, opening up to our romantic youth about to embark upon the long understanding and interpretation. life which is now history, I find myself reflecting The archivist who spends uncounted hours order on how much of a life is forgotten; on moments ing and providing for the physical well-being of archi summation, we never recognized1 as thresholds; on the fallacy val materials has intimate knowledge of the fragmen of on how the final frozen frames of tary and deceptive nature of these bits of evidence. a life cheat us all. Such an understanding is required, in fact, to fully develop the role of the archivist as an interpreter. As Witkin would not have called himself an archivist, an interpreter-not policeman or magician-the ar but he was a collector and a student of history and art, chivist must be able to reveal the hidden lacunae, false <; which involved him in some of an archivist's activi fa ades, concealed linkages, and atmospheric distor ties. I have quoted him here because his words, gain tions as well as the rich treasures inherent in the many ing a self-prophetic poignancy since Witkin's death kinds of evidence. This interpretation begins during last year, are a sensitive meditation on what one learns the organizing and cataloging of materials; "invisible in archives work; that objects or words fail to breathe work" to the researcher, but the crucial process that life back into an event or person of the past. When takes papers and documents out of the category of Witkin speaks of the "fallacy of summation" and how unstructured raw data and gives them an intellectual we are cheated by the "final frozen frames," I believe framework on which we can base access. he meant that the silent and incorruptible data we Gaining access to the archives begins with an in expect to use as tickets for a trip along a reconstructed terview with the archivist during which the prepara passage of a life, are really wooden nickels. tion and expectations of the researcher are discussed. It may seem strange to draw attention to this in This step is more important than most researchers an issue of a publication dedicated to research and an realize, for the archivist must lead the user to materi explication of the past. But the truth of what Witkin als in the collection through heuristic tools such as was saying does not cancel out the very real informa inventories, calendars, and indexes that if used alone tion that can come from archives. Reading Nancy can deceive. Archivist and researcher must come to Newhall's original letters, I hear the cadence of her terms with language and preconceptions and agree on voice and sense the vitality of her imagination. Seeing how to exchange the information each has and each a ravaged page ofW. Eugene Smith's writing plunges needs from the other. The vocabulary and ground me into the tortured passion he felt. Holding in my rules of the archive on one side of this exchange are hands a letter to Edward Weston written on birch unique and no more or less crucial to the success of bark by his friends the Sheelers and McAlpins trans- the researcher than an understanding of the other side 5 I I
I' I l I I
I J
Fragment of birch bark with poem in Sally McAlpin's handwriting sent to Edward Weston, August 1947 Edward Weston Archive of the exchange; the "dependence of questions on con 1927 will probably not prove the researcher's theory text, the dependence of causal explanations on stand that the photographer saw or did not see erotic con point, and 2the dependence of interpretative models tent in his shell photographs. This theory will have to on theory. " be tested against many suggestive documents crea Much of the time, such theoretical issues never get tively extracted from quantities of irrelevant files. discussed, of course. The research question may be Earlier, I mentioned that the archivist should not quite simple-"May I see the original page of Edward function as a policeman. By this I meant that, although Weston's daybook for July 7, 1927?"-in which case, we have a very real obligation to protect the privacy the document is produced and read, and the researcher of the donor and other vulnerable parties, the focus of goes away happy. But if the verbalized research ques our task is access.4 The truism that "the desire to wor tion does not coincide with the user's true and perhaps ship and the desire for intimate knowledge oppose incompletely formulated need for information, then one another, " means that it is ultimately in the inter no quantity of boxes or files brought out will satisfy est of unbiased scholarship to lead the researcher to the researcher. It becomes the familiar standoff, with the greatest variety of evidence. The records of the the researcher saying, "Is this all there is?" one past provide abundant evidence of human frailties; Sometimes this impasse is the result of the illusion evidence with a high potential for misuse especially many users have that they will eventually find the when the tendency in modern archives istoward more piece of evidence, preferably in a single document, to and more current records and toward greater public incontrovertibly prove their theory. We have all read access. We are far from the days when archives re of cases likeHuckleberry the recent Finn discovery of a letter3 by Mark search meant access for a privileged few to the dusty Twain that is being used to disprove the idea that the manuscript collection of the reclusive private collector: author of was a racist. In general, days when ·privacy and access were in equilibrium. however, archival materials contain very few smok Now these are critically sensitive issues, near the sur ing guns. The single page of Weston's daybook from face of every transaction with a researcher.
6 Pages from Edward Weston's daybook, 25 July 1927, in which he denies the allegation of erotic symbolism in his shell photographs Edward Weston Archive Pale ••Ji.Ht .ert•r the du, dUWl'lwhirUru: a.,lral "1:STOlfl'"A'!'IOWS Itu Jl•h wa •urdlk there •1tu.nk 1n H.,OUrOIU l�upr lffti.10l ,a aa0e' le•n• 0 ... th• Haah•ll Hcr•t sacred pubic �•rl hrtlown troa •lAter alcy to 1a.m.i1h toaba to l-ed "'1th bonH Ui:a u,a '"'"I> ot • c,i.�t;tal pin.Jc.n tnus o to ••• ••• ... C ored 1D d1.rkn1tH OW' tall was 1uUtless t.bu, 1D cr,im 1D ,1� 1nvJolate '""'" att.eMf .. J"d ...... wa t"Alled OW' �·· 1. 11b1t.e to brlchtea tb• dud LO He the l:W:I and all roH and ga,,tt-.n the dHet't. br•••t ot SDOW t14 tb• 11.&ahell th•r• '°" ... • �ali, cal.a n u• death 1A • a?iell II.ad dy1n.g into Ute n-•rla1t1nc and tbll roc:lr: bl"U.iaed ltt• thew.,- •u .. �t O th hi.t' ' • •••.ah•...,., 11
'!'bu t.hl. skull.the b:-dnahell t.t;• unten&ri.t..S .....a � Ullhllut1N& 'al&bt taJl to catch an echoed OTertOIM trca her• ·\ an eapt •u i: notbia& not • t Jotn "uenport 9/12/l UI*' bu whn• tt.- "'4,lp He.-ad 1D th• wutt perch.enc• • w..S ai&ht 1row • .,arcnanc• O\ch1�aeeous us" ao. •• HW the atull -"-«••• tha uuball blHker ul• t:• Ude 1t UM•nt or �
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"Westonizations 1936," a poem by John Davenport (1908-1966), British critic and editor Original manuscript is torn and stained Edward Weston Archive
Guiding the researcher toward his or her goals has Davenports. John L. Davenport emerged as a British the advantage of placing the archivist near the flash chemical engineer who corresponded with William point of understanding. As I suggested, it is like watch Mortensen and who wrote for American photogra ing the lighting change on a scrim. A mute scrap of phy magazines. Ansel Adams stated that U.S.his first Camera for paper changes into a bit of exciting gossip with un mulation of the zone system was born out of5 "articles proved significance, and then with luck and_ the right by John L. Davenport that appeared in questions it opens into a document richly loaded with in the autumn and winter"SKULL editions SHELL of DUNES 1940. "NO MORE/ associations, revelations, and the energy to change NO AnotherLESS.... very" different Davenport wrote the poem other documents around it. 1 can think of numerous to Weston which ends, occasions on which I have seen this, but one which John Davenport (1908-1966) the edi comes to mind first began with fragments of a cat tor, critic, and writer was a friend of Malcolm Lowry damaged poem in the Edward Weston Archive. and Dylan Thomas. He was in Hollywood writing a I had been intrigued by these lines of free verse screenplayLilliput in 1936 when he met Edward Weston and signed by John Davenport but had been unable to Charis Wilson. He described a visit to Weston'sCalifor studio connect them to any more information until a re innia and themagazine West. in 1942. Earlier, he gave Charis a searcher asked me what I knew about the name. Out carved pipe, which she described receiving in of a mutual process of picking up clues and following Weston photographed him with his leads, the researcher and I eventually compiled two own pipe and as a monumental head against the sky. 8 negatives and mysteriously signed "W. Eugene Stei chen." The letter to Harry Callahan on the last day of December 1954 is the most personal. ft reveals how Steichen built the exhibition around concepts repre sented by key images. Wayne Miller writes,
Elinor's closeup will be used in the prologue as a symbol of human fertility. ft will be beautiful there. It is one of the few pictures, perhaps the only one, that Steichen has known he would use in the Exhibition from the very beginning. [Wayne Miller for the Museum of Modern Art to Harry Callahan, 31 December 1954, Harry Callahan Archive, Center for Creative Photog raphy]
These letters provided new information, but they were found precisely where logical deduction would lead one to look. This deductive process is helped
Edward Weston: THE MUSEUM OF MODERN ART Portrait ofJohn Davenport, 1937 , .. u,11,<1110, NEW YORK 19 rr,,,,.o,u C:••C II•••• Modern print from original negative C.01111 IIO•lt#t,11 ••• ,c,u: Edward Weston Archive 11 • l.&I ••• PM"O•O I'll• As the interpreter of archival materials, I try to ·-�·· ,, ., .. I ff 01 break down questions into parts by placing events in time and space and identifying a cast of characters. This analysis helps in thinking of what documenta tion might exist to throw light on the question posed by the researcher. For example, if I were asked to re search the Family of Man exhibition held at the Museum of Modern Art in 1955, the cast of characters would include Edward Steichen, who curated the show, and the photographers who participated. The time coor dinates would extend from 1954 to 1956 to encom pass planning and traveling the exhibition, and pub
r-. �• ..._ � •P 10 •mo .,. ..,t\'),lfl01'W lishing the book that accompanied it. The obvious � 13anara. place to begin looking is the archives of W. Eugene S """'17 T01&1'11', Smith, Harry Callahan, Marion Palfi, Wynn Bullock, rr ,._._ and other photographers whose work was shown. <�� z; Each of these photographers kept material about the Family of Man, but the most suggestive documents are the letters the Museum of Modern Art sent out in late 1954. In introducing the exhibition and requesting the participation of the photographer, Edward Stei chen tailored the letters to fit the individual photog rapher. To Marion Palfi he sent an impersonal, printed, form letter requesting one negative from which to Letter from Wayne Miller at the Museum of Modern Art, make an enlargement. W. Eugene Smith was sent the New York, to Harry Callahan, 31 December 1954, same form letter, slightly modified to ask for four requesting three negatives to use in the Family of Man exhibition Harry Callahan Archive
9 THE MUSE UM OF
NEW YORK 19
FHf Of,AIF11,tfN Of ,HO OCHAIIHY fOWAIO s rflCHEH If( ro,
Mr, W, Eugene Smith 13, Old Poat Road North Croton-on-The Hudson New York Dear 11:ugene Saith:
The eeleotion of photographs that will make up the Yamily of !Ian Bxhib1- tion hu been completed. The inolu.aion of eome ot theae print• ,till dependa upon their relationship to the design of the installation, but among the print• that have been det1n1tely selected as key aaterial in the ,rariou.a categories of the ahow are 7our photographe, which 70u oan identit7 b7 the enoloaed amall photoolipP. Yor eu7 reference in oor reaponding with ue, pleue u.ae the numbers we have indicated on the baok of eaoh photoolip, If, in addition to these photographa, any of your other print• are later aeleoted, 7ou will be ao inforaed,
I ea aure you realize the •IID7 complex problem• that oome up in weaving the aeleoted photographl into their uaooiated 1equenoe1 for thia lxhibi tion. Iot the leut of the problems will be the v1aual detera1n1ng of the exact •1•• of the enlargement, for the eeveral ed1t1one of the ehow, tho•• going to different oountriae u well u the 114Jor BXhib1tion here at thelluaeua.
I hope you rlll cooperate with ue by lending the lluaeum your negative,, or if they are not 1n your po1ae11ion, authorizin; your agent to do 10, I fully realize that I am aoking a great deal in making thia request, but I hope you rlll recognize the neoeaaity for it,
The enlargement• will be made under my euperviaion, and the lfuseum will, of ooure,, take the ,aa, oare of your negatives while in our ouatod7 that 1a taken of all worn of art. And they will be 1naured at 7our valuation.
The negative, will, naturally, be returned to you. We are now muoh be hind aohedul•, and your prompt cooperation will be a great help.
Will you pleaee give ue eome brief biographioal data on the enoloeed fora, and the peraieaion to reproduce 7our photographs in oonneotion with IIUaewa publicity about the Bxhibition? I hope you rtll return the information ahe•t at your earlieat oonvenienoe.
With all good rtahea.
Sinoerely youra, :rt�<'"�- a/r Bdward Steiohen
Letter from Edward Steichen at the Museum of Modern Art, New York, to W. Eugene Smith, I 9 November I 954, requesting four negatives to use in the Family of Man exhibition W. Eugene Smith Archive Page from Wynn Bullock's negative index Cards with contact prints attached from Jerry Uelsmann's Wynn Bullock Archive negative index Jerry Uelsmann Collection along by asking questions like, "Who were the pho an archive, such as lack of evidence, obfuscation by tographer's friends and acquaintances?" "Was the pho the donor, and the poetic presence of documents, as it tographer involved in any workshops/ exhibitions/ is to weigh and measure each tangible piece of data. publications that would have brought him into con As David Jacobs points out in his essay Labyrinths, the tact with anyone else we know?" "Who would he absence of a letter can simply mean a phone call or have been likely to write interesting letters to?" These personal visit was substituted for written communi questions help us decide where to look, but manu cation. Other omissions arc not so easily explained. scripts, unlike books in a library, do not occupy their What if the photographer was a meticulous compiler own neat space on a shelf. From the time they are of scrapbooks, carefullypreserving page after page of created, letters, diaries, and other records wander in exhibition announcements, checklists, and clippings. often unpredictable paths and may disappear for years. If there is no page for one year does it mean the artist Sleuthing, or more often serendipity alone, accounts did not exhibit? Or, perha-ps, like the dog that did not for the discovery of treasures such as the first draft of bark in the Sherlock Holmes story and thereby re Herman Melville's firstnovel Typee, recently discov vealed the identity of the thief, the lack of that page ered in a New York barn. 6 in the scrapbook may be a clue. Some research can lead the frustrated user to phan Another invisible , yet powerful force at work in tom topics that seem to leave no footprints. However, creating archival records is the obfuscation, structur it is just as important to examine the invisible parts of ing, and rewriting of history that often goes on dur-
11 Pages in scrapbook made by Andreas Fcininger. Left: Map of United States tracing Feininger's travel for "American Names" published in Life, 31 January 1944. Right: Train tickets and match book covers from travel for "American Names" project Andreas Feiningcr Archive ing and after an artist's life. I am reminded of what In attempting to describe a third invisible element, Gore Vidal recently wrote about Tennessee Williams's the poetic presence of objects, I come full circle to the habit of revising short stories that had already been paradox with which I began. Letters, records, and arti published. When Vidal asked Williams why he did it, facts cannot make the past fully dimensional, yet their the response was, "Well, obviously it's not finished." presence alone transmits intensely convincing infor In the same way, photographers with a sense of his7 mation. Arthur Schlesinger, Jr., has described work tory often exercise the impulse to control the docu ing in the manuscript division of the Library of Con mentation of their life. This can be seen in Edward gress during the summer of 1941 and losing himself Weston's habit of destroying original correspondence in the events and personalities of the past. "At five after copying selected parts into his daybook or in o'clock, when the library closed, I would come out structing correspondents to "Destroy!" his letters af into the sunlight and heat of the Washington of Frank ter reading them. This impulse is obvious in the me lin Roosevelt. While I was entangled in the nineteenth ticulous and highly personal way Andreas Feininger century, the twentieth century world was exploding assembled scrapbooks documenting his travel on as around me. " Similar emotional entanglements affect signment and in the less structured scrapbooks of Paul researchers who8 look at the enamel wall cabinets W. Strand, which juxtapose his own work with other Eugene Smith covered with jagged aphorisms of hu photographers' and events. mor, self-hate, and pleas for help. It is the same with
12 \\ ,. \u111i11at,· for th,· Hall of F:11nr:
Pages from Paul Strand scrapbook, copyright © Paul Strand Archive and Library, Aperture Foundation, Millerton, N. Y. Left: Page from June 1924. Right: Strand's boxing photographs as published in the 13 September 1924 Va11iry Fair, Daily Mirror, Paul Strand Archive
Cigars with photographic bands by Jerry Uelsmann, ca. 1975. Paper cigar bands show Uelsmann, alligators, and angels Jerry Uelsmann Archive tDP HWARD O T O C �WtST A P H ON E � CARMtL • BY•THf-SE�
CA LIFORNIA
BLUNNING �y I, 19)0. all portraits w,11 be made and prints sold. on tbe
following tcnm:
The charge for a sitting and two prinu---thc minimum order-is $
duplicate prints, $ each. A payment of $ is dueat time
of sittjng, the balance upon delivery of the finished work. Printswill be shipped
C. 0. 0., or, if preferred, a check may be mailed an advance.
If necessary, a re-sluing will be made. either u my request or the situr's, but
when ao order is once given from proofs, acceptance of prints is understood.
It lS further unde-�tood that prmu arc w Ix finished accordtng to my personal
judgment.
EDWARD WESTON
M.3y I have perrnissionto exhibit or publish your portrait? Abo1,·r cundilions ort ,mdastooJ ond 11ectpltd.
[SIGNATUU]
RECEIVED ON ACCOUNT from
the rum of ($
Portrait order form used by Edward Weston in the 1930s. Sent in letter to Johan Hagemeyer Johan Hagemeyer Archive 1 less sensational objects like envelopes, address books, Lee Witkin, A Te,, Year Salute:NOTES A Selection of Photographs i11 Cele bration. The Witki11 Gallery, 1969-1979 (Danbury, N.H.: Addison grocery lists, and the cropping marks on contact House, 1979), p. 22. sheets. These also impart an almost physical shock of Martin Kemp,"The Taking and Use of Evidence: With a Botti immediacy from the vanished personality. 2cellian Case Study," Art Jou ma/ 44:3 (Fall 1984), p. 208. The fallacy of summation, the fallacy ofthe smok 'Mark Twain's letter, written in 1885, recommended that Yale Law ing gun, the fallacy of thinking evidence speaks for School admit a young black student and offered ,o pay his ex penses. After lengthy authentication by Twain scholars, the pri itself, and the fallacy of forming conclusions too hast vate collectors who had acquired the letter made it public specific ily are potential traps in the path ofresearch. Ifl have ally to revise public opinion of Huckleberry Finn. The novel in pointed them out here, it is only because skepticism recent years has been removed from high school reading lists in is a healthy attitude for archivist and researcher alike. the United States in response to an interpretation of Twain's por How else, but with the tools of skepticism, energy, trayal of blacks. 'Patricia Meyer Spacks, Gossip (New York: Knopf, 1985), p. 101. passion, wit, and patience, could we hope to unravel 5 Ansel Adams, The egative (Boston: New York Graphic Society, mysteries of historical evidence like the following 1981), p. xi. remarkable lines in a letter from Edward Weston to 6 Steve Lerner, "The Gansevoort Papers," Connoisseur (May 1985), Ansel Adams, pp. 130, 132, 134, 136. 7 Gore Vidal, "Immortal Bird," New York Review of Books (June 13, 9 1985), p. 9. Stieglitz liked baseball and Beethoven; 8 Arthur Schlesinger, Jr.," 'Prich': A New Deal Memoir," New I like football and Bach. York Review of Books (March 28, 1985), p. 21. 'Edward Weston to Ansel Adams, 9 November 1946, Ansel Adams Correspondence, Center for Creative Photography.
15 Letter and envelope handwritten in ink from Alfred Stieglitz to Paul Strand, 4 August 1921. Letter is ten pages, with sheets numbered one to twelve Paul Strand Archive Labyrinths
DAVID JACOBS by L.
WORKING IN AN ARCHIVE IS NOT UNLIKE ENTERING A
of the photographers were especially relevant to my labyrinth. To be sure, most scholars emerge from the sabbatical project. For some time I had been working stacks with limbs intact, and very few researchers on a book that analyzes what, following Michel Fou perish at the horns of raging Minotaurs. But such cault, I call the "archaeology of photographic knowl wanderers are no less subject to disorientation than in edge." As much as any technology, photography has bygone Cretan days. Truth, like the bull, is elusive, enacted changes in knowledge and world view with multi-faceted, and potentially lethal. It lives, if it lives its images of things as they once, fleetingly, appeared. at all, within a maze of false starts and dead ends. The photographer, studying the flat, inverted image Every wall looks like every other, right and left are on the ground glass; the viewer, teased by an image's indistinguishable, and blank walls loom where one incomplete information; the family, gathered about hoped for a passageway. an album gazing upon its own abstracted history; the Such uncertainty evokes a broad range of responses. magazine browser, skipping texts for pictures-all One is simultaneously attracted to and repulsed by represent states of consciousness that are unique to the prospect of the bull: arms are extended as anxious and constitutive of our age. Photography comprises feet tread backwards. When the labyrinth exhilarates a set of modern epistemological conditions and para one can feel kinship with the women in Minoan fres doxes that reflect larger patterns of how our culture coes who grabbed the beast by the horns and leapt knows and evaluates itself. high over its haunches. At other times there is dread Seen in such broad terms, it is little wonder that at the kinds of truth the bull may reveal. Sometimes the quality of photographic discourse has been so un the bull seems to have no substance whatsoever, ex even during the last 150 years. Few minds are capable cept in the imagination of the searcher. And when of grasping, much less articulating, such a complex of ambiguities prevail, the bull, the truth, the maze, the connections. But even when discussing photography exhilaration, the anxiety-all seem pointless, futile. as if it were a subject unto itself, photographic writ Adrift in a manuscript world, the search for the ing has generally been disappointing. Photographers bull is coextensive with the knowledge of self. The have long confronted nettlesomeproblems when ana labyrinth is one with the folds of the cerebral cortex, lyzing their medium. In the nineteenth century, P. H. knower and known are inseparable and irreducible. Emerson twisted himself into a pretzel as he tried to The researcher casts one eye toward the quarry, while discover a theoretical base for his work; he finally
INthe otherAND looks at itselfI HAD looking. THE GOOD FORTUNE TO escaped his labyrinth only by quitting photography altogether. Henry Peach Robinson tried a simpler tack 1982 1983 by proposing a handful of painterly formulae for pro spend a lengthy sabbatical conducting research in the ducing arty pictures. Others, like Timothy O'Sulli archives of the Center for Creative Photography. I van, apparently wrote little or nothing about their decided to explore the Center's manuscript collections chosen craft, omissions that could suggest wisdom as in particular since the letters, journals, and notebooks well as reticence. In our own day most photographers 17 steer clear of theoretical analysis. "Slide lectures" are ease with which acceptable snapshots can be made replete with muttered evasions and platitudes about only increases the feeling that there is nothing espe the sources and meaning of photographs. "The pic cially subtle about the production or meaning of these tures talk best for me" is a familiar refrain in such images. We take photographs for granted, a posture presentations; most audiences don't dispute the claim. which makes us especially susceptible to their persua But the formidable problems of making verbal sive powers. As Walter Benjamin suggested, "the sense of photographic experience transcend the idio public is an examiner, but an absent-minded one. " 2 syncrasies of photographers' psyches, as is amply dem Generally speaking, the more pervasive a phenom onstrated by the paucity of insightful photographic enon, the more it resists theoretical analysis. Those criticism. Whether the subject is the origin of a parti activities that seem most natural, that we most take cular photographer's vision, or the meaning of a given for granted, are often unyielding. In the sciences what photograph or body of work, or the connections be we might term "paradoxes of ubiquity" are pervasive. tween photographic practice and social or economic Healthy human children, for example, easily learn contexts, most photographic critics circle rather than grammar and syntax, yet linguists are hard pressed to penetrate their subject. More often than not, the words explain how this takes place, to say nothing of the simply fall short of doing justice to the images and neurological conditions that allow human beings to the issues they raise. Nor, I should hasten to add, am speak such a multitude of languages. Physicists, who I exempt. Indeed, a major reason for my long-stand only a few decades ago boasted that they had discov ing interest in photographic theory is the problems I ered in atoms the basic building block of the universe, have confrontedbut by no means resolved in my own are now adrift in a sea of quarks and snarks that con thinking about photography. Not all of those mum stitute octopus tentacles, fingernails, redwood fences, bling photographers standing before slide-bound au and everything else. On a more mundane level, Lewis diences are being purposefullyevasive or coy. Rather, Thomas has suggested, with characteristic terseness their false starts and halting conclusions point, with and humor, that if and when we understand the sense ironic eloquence, to the problem of expressing what of smell we may well have reached the outer limits of may well be the inexpressible. science. And most anthropologists investigate socie At first glance, the theoretical problems photog ties vastly different from their own because it is so raphy poses seem fairly easy to resolve. Most photo difficult to penetrate the covert terms and logic of graphs appear to be relatively straightforward rep one's native milieu. resentations of the events set before the lens. The The paradox of ubiquity is also a central problem transformation of a chromatic, three-dimensional, in photographic theorizing. The sheer pervasiveness fluid world into a monochromatic, two-dimensional, of photography seems to preclude our ordering it. static image presents problems in terms of what and Being immersed in photographs from birth, we are how a given image means and the kinds of interpre unable to perceive with much clarity the contours of tative operations a viewer should perform. Although the subject. The search for the crux of photographic these difficulties hardly seem insurmountable, they practices and meanings is delimited by our own si have proven to be remarkably resistant to theoretical multaneous participation in same. We need to jump formulation. Writers like Susan Sontag, Rudolf Arn out of ourselves as members of a photographic cul heim, Janet Malcolm, Roland Barthes, Marx Wartof ture, and observe ourselves as we make and experience sky, and Owen Barfield, all of whom have made photographs. However, such bifurcative vision is major contributions in other fields, have discovered notoriously difficult to achieve and sustain. at first hand the subtle complexities involved in theo Problems like these conditioned many of my hopes rizing photography. The sheer ubiquity of photog and expectations as I began work at the Center. I raphy significantly contributes to the medium's theo planned to read through the personal papers of some retical dilemmas. Few Americans pass a day without of our greatest photographers to see how they talked experiencing a multitude of photographs, most of about the creation and meaning of their images in which enter into consciousness without being con the privacy of their notebooks, journals, and letters. sciously registered. Subway stations and freewaybill I wanted to see whether such publicly strident and boards, TV and magazines vie for our attention and self-assured figures as Stieglitz, Strand, and Adams pocketbooks as they inundate us with images. 1 The privately questioned their own photographic prac-
18 Pages one and two ofletter from Alfred Stieglitz to Paul Strand, 4 August 1921 Paul Strand Archive tice and the rhetoric that accompanied it. And, most that otherwise would have been overlooked. As we pervasively, if most amorphously, I sought any avail will presently see, whatever laby rinths I discovered able means for transcending the problems and para were wholly a function of the problems inherent in doxes that have long beset thinking and writing about scholarship itself. photography. I felt some initial discomfort at reading the private papers of famous people: W. Eugene Smith's bills, THE CENTER'S HOLDINGS CONTAINED MUCH THAT WAS Wynn Bullock's journalsin his finalmonths, the irrev relevant to my project on photographic theory, and erent marginalia in Ansel Adams's letters. My pre I soon found my self working through papers, journals, conceptions about these men and women, and about notebooks, proof sheets, and photographs. At first I the history of photography in general, were often was preoccupied with the mechanics of archival re countered by an aside in a journal, a postscript in a search: learningto decipher scrawled handwriting and letter, or a reference to some long-forgotten photo private abbreviations as well as devising an efficient graph. The unexpected and unknown piqued my curi note-taking system. The archivists were especially osity, and I quickly realized that off-handedcomments crucial at this stage. Not only did they explain the could be more revealing than self-consciously somber Center's policies and restrictions for reading and writ pronouncements upon art and life. ing about the documents, but their intimate knowl I didn't abandon my theoretical project, but I didn't. edge of the organization and contents of the collec stick to it with single-minded attention either. Had I tions proved invaluable. In many instances Charles had only one or two weeks at the Center, and a very Lamb and Amy Stark, the archivists I worked most specific project in mind (theory is seldom discrete, closely with, steered me toward important materials alas), I would not have been as prone to wandering.
19 Pages three, four, five and six Pages seven and eight
But with the luxury of two years before me and the career, I turned to the correspondence between Strand evident richness of the archives, I succumbed to temp and Stieglitz (1917 through 1931). 3 When reading tation. The change in focus was disconcerting. Here I through these letters my interest in Strand began to was with enough time, finally, to research a book on wane (his letters, truth to say, were not among his issues of long-standing interest, but instead of pursu finest achievements), while Stieglitz's epistolary style ing it with dogged attention, I strayed. For a time I and substance were of considerable interest. Upon thought that blue skies in January (we had the good completing the Stieglitz-Strand correspondence, I sense to leave Michigan in December) precluded the began to study the other Stieglitz materials that were gray realms usually associated with theoretical mus on hand at the Center. Soon after l began reading the ings. On the tennis court, fellow Sybarites and I devel correspondence between Stieglitz and Ansel Adams oped elaborate explanations for why theorizing was (1933 through 1946) it became clear that Strand and impossible during balmy Arizona winters. For what Adams brought out different sides of Stieglitz. As is ever reason , I gave myself over to the papers, allowing often the case among close friends, their unique inter them to take me where they would. What follows is a personal histories determined the kinds of things each brief recounting of that journey. correspondent did and did not discuss with one an Early in my research I studied the Paul Strand ma other, as well as the style and tone of their communi terials with the hope of better understanding Strand's ques. Implicit in these shifts are serious problems somewhat mystifying combination of aesthete and of how a scholar or biographer comes to know a political activist. After going through Strand's scrap subject, issues that we will return to later. books, which consist of hundreds of clippings, re Adams and Stieglitz corresponded at length about views, and other memorabilia documenting his long the role of photography at the Museum of Modern
21 P·)
Pages nine (numbered "10") and ten (numbered "12")
Art.Photography Stieglitz had1839-1937, long been hostile to the Modern, between Adams and the Newhalls collaterally with and when asked by Adams if he would show his work the Adams-Stieglitz correspondence, since all were in he refused. Responding to discussing matters in common. Ansel Adams's request for advice about the exhibi The Adams-Newhall correspondence began to in tion, Stieglitz wrote: terest me for its own sake as well.Though Beaumont and Adams corresponded frequently, the majority of As for sending anything to the Museum of Mod the correspondence on file at the Center is between ern Art Show I think you should be represented. Adams and Nancy, both of whom were fine and pro ...No T haven't anything to do with the show. lific letter6 writers. Their correspondence covered many Of course "the man" was to see me last spring of the key events of mid-century American photog & a few days ago again. A nice person. I forget raphy, which they discussed with the sort of candor his name. I refused to show my own work. possible only between old and good friends. Reading There arc many solid reasons. I haven't the time, through this copious correspondence, I felt the plea energy, money or4 interest to get my things ready. sure of observing, through primary documents, im Besides I hate the exhibition passion as evidenced portant historical episodes as they were lived, com in our country. plete with the false starts and dead ends that all of us experience as we try to make sense of and act within
"The man" was Beaumont5 Newhall, who a few days our lives. before had written Stieglitz asking him to participate Their correspondence concerningthe Photo League in the exhibition. I began to read the correspondence is a case in point. Adams and the Newhalls had joined
22 the Photo League after the war, and many members ficult to achieve such empathy when we know the hoped that their presence would help broaden the outcome of these episodes (the dissolution of the membership and expand the agenda of the organiza League, McCarthyism, blacklists, etc.) and have al tion. When the League was named as a Communist ready adopted a stance toward them. front in 1947, its members were shocked and outraged. I found these documents invigorating and educa Adams joined Leo Hurwitz, Edward Weston, Ben tional, in part because their fragmentary nature con Shahn, Dorothea Lange, and others in denouncing trasted so sharply with the narrative framework of the charges and urged the membership7 "not [to] feed most histories. When reading history we are usually the wrath of the stupid [but to] bring shame to them encouraged to regard the account we hold in our through images of the truth. " But in the privacy of hands as a reliable index of the historical actuality. their letters, Adams and Nancy Newhall expressed The mere presence of a Gibbon or a Toynbee, bind reservations about the Photo League, questioned how ing everything together with a voice of coherence,Tom Jones their association with the organization could affect lets us think that we've got the goods at last, in much their careers, and pondered when and how to tender the same way that Fielding's narrator in their resignations. In 1949, when a former member8 of becomes as significant as the people and events he the Photo League, Angela Calomiris, testified that describes. But now I was the historian, and as I read she had been a FBI plant in the Photo League, Adams through correspondence and notebooks, studied proof and Newhall exchanged lengthy, soul-searching let sheets and exposure records, there was no consoling, ters, and both promptly wrote Walter Rosenblum, omniscient voice to tell me what went where and why. then the president of the League. In these letters Adams, There is no overstating the difference that mediation Newhall, and Rosenblum pondered the problems be makes. At first I felt a sense of power when reading fore them and possible solutions. Newhall and Adams these documents, derived in equal parts from the subsequently discussed Rosenblum's ideas between voyeurism inherent in the enterprise and because now themselves, while Rosenblum rehashed these same I could try my hand at playing God. But after the first letters with Paul Strand, who was in France at the flush of power came persistent and nagging doubts. time, and who was a close friend of all three. The All too often, these materials defied my attempts to labyrinth is further complicated by Barbara Morgan, categorize, order, and rationalize. Good modern to who believed that the League was in fact a Commu the end, I was soon as excited by the limits that such nist front, and that Strand,9 not Sid Grossman, was at materials represent as I was by the knowledge I was the bottom of it. Unlike Newhall and Adams, Mor gaining as I studied .them. gan promptly resigned, and her resignation in turn The more I read, the more the horizon marking became the subject of discussion and criticism among some mythical completion of my project receded. I these various correspondents. moved on to the papers of W. Eugene Smith, Wynn In this constellation of correspondence, a fair Bullock, and Minor White. I spent most of my resi amount of stumbling and agonizing is apparent. None dency reading materials that, though not wholly unre of these men and women emerged without having lated to my book on photographic theory, extended reconsidered his or her own politics and values, as considerably beyond its terms. l soon learned to stop well as the general tenor of the times. For everyone it worrying about the research necessarily leading to an was a singularly painful set of musings. Armed with article or book and instead went where the materials forty years exof posthistoricalfacto hindsight, it is easy to adopt took me, however directionless the passageways might a pat stance on this episode and engage in a fair prove to be.· amount of second-guessing. But to read While reading through so many papers, I became the correspondence of those directly involved, and to increasingly interested in the methodological and the observe at close hand how they struggled with a dis oretical problems involved in writing history and turbing set of events and issues, is to glimpse history biography. One recurrent problem was the tension as it was lived rather than subsequently reconstructed between the public and private sides of individuals. and simplified. To understand such historical mo Such tensions are especially important in America, ments we must begin to experience, vicariously, the where being a public figure can neutralize the subver anxiety and confusion that they evoked; but it is dif- sive, if not revolutionary energy that often lies behind 23 en masse a new v1s1on or synthesis. As James Baldwin has On the other hand, seemingly everything W. Eugene recently noted, an artist in America is Smith ever owned or borrowed was sent to the Center while Smith was still alive. In Smith's ... either a success or a failure and there's noth case, the enormity of his archives was not so much a ing in between. And if you are a success, you function of Proustian egoism, in which everything is run the risk that Norman [Mailer] has run and deemed interesting and relevant, as a casual indiffer that I run, too, of becoming a kind of show ence to such matters. business personality. Then the legend become3 Clearly, artists vary greatly with respect to how far more important than the work. It's as thoug'.1 they dispense with their personal effects. Eliot's posi you're living in an echo chamber.You hear only tion can be defended on the grounds that artists reveal your own voice. And, when you become a celeb more about �heir inner states than the great majority
rity, that voice is magnified10 by multitudes and of people and that they should not be obligated to you begin to drown in this endless duplication share everything with future historians. At the same of what looks like yourself. time, scholars are thankful for the extensive archives that Adams, Smith, and others have leftbehind, since Artists who have achieved celebrity status often they greatly facilitate our understanding of these pho flee from the public eye in order to sustain their crea tographers and their times.The question of how much tive energies and avoid the "duplication of what looks we are entitled to know about public personages is a like yourself," a uniquely modern maze born of com subtle and open-ended one. But it is imperative for munications technology. Such problems also affect the researcher to determine how a particular archive how artists regard the trailings of their creative life: was assembled, arranged, and edited, since the genesis the drafts, sketches, negatives, letters, journals, and of an archive determines in part what a researcher can notebooks that are burned in the fireplace, or be and cannot know about a given subject. queathed to heirs, or donated to archives. An artist's It is equally important for readers to be aware of way of handling such materials is obviously a function the kinds of sources that were and were not available of how he or she wishes to be remembered by poster to a writer. For example, in the preface to her biog ity. T. S. Eliot vigorously opposed artists' biographies, raphy of Diane Arbus, Patricia Bosworth explains to the extent that he destroyed many of his personal that the executrix of the estate, Arbus's daughter papers while instructing his heirs to discourage post Doon, "told me she could not contribute to any biog 11 humous biographies. Eliot felt that only an artist's raphy that touched on her mother's life-'the work published work was important and that the history speaks for itself.' " Other central figures in Arbus's and inner workings of the artist were largely irrele life, includingDiane Arbus ex-husband Alan Arbus and her close vant. These positions, as well as Eliot's insistence that friend Marvin Israel, held the same position. Accord the work of art should stand on its own, independent ingly, is based largely upon hundreds of of the cultural or historical contexts that surrounded interviews that Bosworth often takes at face value. its making, became canonical in New Critical theory. Bereft of Arbus's private papers and the testimony of Others adopt a less extreme position. Edward many who knew her best, Bosworth had little choice Weston, for example, recorded his mundane daily but to privilege these interviews. Obviously, knowing activities as well as his aesthetic manifestos in "day this kind of information is essential for an informed books" that he wanted to become part of his public reading of any biography or history. self. His efforts to have them published during his The more I read, the more I gravitated toward cor lifetime were unsuccessful, but he continued to pre respondence. Although we understand intellectually serve the diaries along with large files of correspon that celebrities, too, are only human, nowhere is this dence and other personal papers. Just as he censored more apparent than in letters and other private papers. his past in excising certain passages and names from When reading letters between close friends like Strand his daybook manuscript, Weston declined any public and Stieglitz, or Adams and the Newhalls, one ob access to parts of his history by destroying many let serves the ups and downs of the relationship, their ters. He later spoke of "last rites over a flaming pile gripes about this or that photographer, publisher, of love notes" in a fragment from his early day book. friend, or enemy, and their evolving attitudes about
24 134 Old Post Road North w. ElibENE SMITH Croton-on-Hudson Naw York
Octoter 11, 195}
Dear Beau..ont:
The bad mno.r..,ro of ;q erratic p11yment of att.ention to "8ttoro i,aportant, including correa�oruianc•, a.re an &lvaye continuing re�ret 1m .:..J life. !late� ov..en+--Gnurtaat t d.eai:N •• 1«ri !OJ taou, and itm lovin£1Y- I atand, ill e.t oaH, o;nbarraued Lefore tneae detail• of 11Jil 11.t'e--l-'-laMlll..,ay
/ proi,erly, I n.a;.:e little headva:, age.ir.ot the �of t.,e J>lcoue ..ore A A.> A?,o,R_r '"J. • 'fJtt.,c 11:;r,�J' ,,_-.T ·'f. •· , A ,.tl) ouffocated by thom ..tntil it seemo that ,!a,e �etail drain uy creative lit• 1 '!o(_ av-::.)Thi• h a 10,,,.what complicated, and ;,roLably not a very clear way to
exprea1 m:J e.nbarraeewent, end� •1ncera &E,-Ologiea, for leav.1r..& as 5l'iF ut
»•hUi... l. too JJB'n// noteii illlflw fro111. yo11, =replied to, I.- nave wanted to re;,ly caref11lly, ..,. �"f';:;;,a •low, r,ot neceuarilJ uet.oodical worker ,-+-�;:lr $ � ""C ,,.,,,,,.,,,,.....,,w,,w-./:1.'f'!:{',!a lack of tillle, I ;.ave ,o•trone
m&n/ tilleo,.... :iven r,ow, wit.• thi• letter, I am .;ooti,o«itg a,_ain, no?ir.,, �
you will ur,derot.Emd M.,,.ffll)llintfr that when I do not� it io �an 4 A'�t,l(..Y�C,- , ,,.,,_. •• .-.,, -r-fqS 1"' f,!:-� o-"'liuion cauoed .,-�� . · r • --1et ra t:,er ii A c• ••od '4a hw ble ,r � VI ru1AM,eJ\. =lr • reo,ect t,.. t i.a:r.eo .a w1oh to f'ltffff refl/ w1t:1 t.,e t'wt ccnaideration
� I feel ia yowr•, by right, tftrbtffi
.Jo ?l•••• t.ie ,&.t.l•ntf- 111itn u, ri.a accept ey war eat �eraonal regard•,
Typed draft of letter with pencil notes from W. Eugene Smith to Beaumont Newhall, 11 October 1953 W. Eugene Smith Archive Typed, stamped envelope from Ansel Adams to Nancy Newhall, 9 May 1954 Beaumont and Nancy Newhall Papers
12 photography and life in general. Letters, with their enough thought-concentration-at the time of kaleidoscopic changes in subject and tone, often mime working. the convoluted passageways of a mind at work, and it was this homology that most attracted me to corre In a different vein, Stieglitz writes longingly about spondence. his defunct gallery, 291, but leavens his sentimentality
For example, Stieglitz was capable of great shifts with humor. 13 within a single, brief letter. He could begin by com plaining about the instability of developing baths, Seven years ago at this time I was in the midst rave about O'Keeffe's latest painting, complain about of preparing "What is 291 ?"-It seems an eter aching joints, and conclude with some well-turned nity ago-Still as if only yesterday-It is some nastiness about a friend or foe.I was especially drawn times difficultfor me to believe that I am living. to Stieglitz's wit, introspection, and self-criticism, ... (291] was clean.-Very clean.-An incredi since these qualities are seldom present in published ble performance. When I look back upon it I accounts. The correspondence reveals a man who was don't see how it ever could have happened. all too aware of his fallibility and who shared his foi And happening, how it could have existed in bles with others, casting them in a humorous, self concrete form for so many years. I wonder will deprecatory light. Most photographers will take solace I ever grow up. I'm making a mad stab in trying in hearing Stieglitz's lament to Strand. to achieve the result-Grow Up!-Ye Gods what does it mean? Distrust the world? Every Took a wonderful photo early this morning body except oneself?-no, I guess I'll never rising mists-No plate in holder!! The 3rd time quite grow14 up. It's too much like a business I've lost a certain masterpiece this summer in venture. that way ....I decided yesterday that I hadn't produced 40 good prints out of the 400 I made Later in the same letter, Stieglitz indulges in a self this summer!-And it made me feel pretty sick. parodic meditation upon death and transfiguration. Of course, I could blame the often really stupid paper or the bad printing weather or the lack of We ll, yesterday was yesterday-today is another facilities-the unrest-But I don't.-There is no day.-Caruso is still dead-and the sun doesn't excuse for many of the failures. Just simply not seem to weep over it-and the flies are just as 26 numerous-some trees growing-some others success in the university and the publishing world is silently lingeringly dying-the sky intangible. measured by the supposed newness of a point of view. -Am preparing myself for heavcn.-Am hav Articles and books arc published according to whether ing it cleaned out. I'll be the only one there. they make "original" contributions to a field, and the God of course there to receive me. If I don't same criteria arc used in granting academic tenure and think he's fit company I'll have to get rid of promotion. But too often new viewpoints are achieved him. I shall try the seven day (or six day) myself by analyzing a small amount of carefully chosen data -G[eorgia O'Keeffe] wants to know whether through a narrowly conceived, polemical point of
1 view. My point is not to indict the mixed motives of she isn't to be with me. I said she is to take' care of the other Place. Between us we'll have com scholars, though plenty could be said on that subject, ple.tc control-Be thoroughly modern. but rather that career pressures within the Academy and the publishing world often breed reductive writ Some of Stieglitz's contemporaries, as well as sev ing and thinking. Moreover, in treating complicated eral present-day critics, have charged Stieglitz with men and women as if they were ciphers battling on being egotistical, autocratic, vain, pretentious, and some oversimplified, yes/no battlefield, readers and worse. Passages like those quoted above do not in writersPeople alike believe that they "have a handle" on this themselves invalidate such claims. They do, however, or that person. The mass psychology that makes introduce sides of Stieglitz's character and personality magazine popular at the supermarket is all too that are often absent from the public versions of the often at work in the realms of biography and histori man. As in photography, so too in scholarship: selec cal writing. We want to believe that complicated peo tion is the key. The materials in the archive are inert ple can be held in the palm of our hand, much as a until the researcher brings them to life, just as the 2x2" snapshot of the Grand Canyon provides the con visual world can remain unperceived until the pho soling if illusory impression that we can possess and tographer sees and frames it. If there are a sufficient comprehend its enormity. number of letters in an archive (and there are thou Adrift in the archival labyrinth, I became increas sands of letters to Stieglitz at Yale), numerous con ingly committed to writing about the materials as flicting portraits can be created. The same letters can unreductively as possible. While historians cannot be used to portray Stieglitzwhat as saint or sinner, pro know certain things that an eyewitness participant gressive or reactionary. Archival documents are un takes for granted, "they nonetheless have access to a questionably revealing, but they reveal is largely much broader array of materials and perspectives than a function of the researcher's methods and aims. the eyewitness. In many cases, the scholar's most chal ,Scholarly portraits of historical personages can be lenging task lies in remaining open to the mazes born every bit as reductive ·as photographic portraits, dis of too much information. I believe an ideal biography closing some traits while obscuring others. In either of a personage like Stieglitz would transcend any case, incompleteness should be assumed as a given. single, monofocal approach and instead frame the Too oftenbiographical and scholarly accounts sub man and his times in the broadest possible terms. The tract the vital spirit that made a man like Stieglitz so biographer would have to escape from the highly po compelling, if problematic, to those who knew him. lemical climate that surrounded Stieglitz when he was When reading current revisionist writing on Stieglitz, alive and that continues to follow him even forty for example, I am sometimes hard-pressed to under years after his death. Finally, a relatively unreductive stand how such a man could have influenced so many portrait would take into account the full range of of his contemporaries. This kind of reductionism only Stieglitz's complexities and contradictions. Few of us, increases with time: since fewer and fe�er people are whether famous or unknown, manage to resolve the alive who knew Stieglitz directly, researchers can con confusions and problems of our lives. We know one struq versions of his life thattrue never would have been another through our contradictions, not in spite of accepted twenty or thirty years ago. At the same them, and conscientious analysis should reflect, rather time, they can also say things about him that than implicitly deny, such troublesome truths. could not have been said twenty or thirty years ago. But a desire to write unreductively is more easily Such reductionism has obvious advantages for writ stated than accomplished. Among other things, when ers and readers. As in so many American institutions, studying private documents it is all too easy to lose 27 17 perspective and objectivity.One begins to empathize I found myself involved in equally hot defense with the life and mind of the subject,and it is a small of the photographers in Paris. step from such empathy to an uncritical embrace. The Decisive Leon Edel,who spent over twenty years researching TheMoment representative figures of these "ideals and meth Henry James for his multivolume biography,has sug ods" were HenriCartier-Bresson, whose gested that had just been published,and Edward Weston. Newhall's portrait of Cartier-Bresson,among the Biographers must struggle constantly not to be first to appear in an American publication,was largely taken over by their subjects, or to fall in love based upon her visits with him in Paris. Her descrip with them. The secret of this16 struggle is to learn tion of Cartier-Bresson's working methods has long to be a participant observer. since entered into common photographic lore.
This is all too evident in the great bulk of photo I am sure Henri Cartier-Bresson puts on his graphic scholarship,both because researchers do in Leica as automatically as he puts on his shoes. deed fall in love with their subjects and because much He is never without it. He carries no parcels photographic scholarship,past and present,is under ever,so that he may always be instantly ready. takenartiste. with the hidden agenda of furthering photog At any moment the worn case may appear open; raphy's status as art,and the photographer's status as without looking down, without haste, he sets The prominence of this motive in photographic the shutter and the stop. With a slow flow of a writing too often militates againstAlfred tough-minded Stieglitz: An hunter anxious not to attract the gaze of his wild Americanquestioning; Seer instead, Minorit breedsWhite: theA Livingkind of Remembrance, hagiography game,he raises the camera to his eye,clicks, and evidenced in Dorothy Norman's as slowly lowers it.No one has noticed so quiet or and natural a motion .... He can vanish from both of which are devoted to the apotheosis of their your side in a street only moderately crowded; respective subjects.As Edel suggests,the best schol you can scan it carefully and not see him.Then, ars manage simultaneously to participate in and ob just as suddenly,his camera back under his arm, serve their subject, but such postures remain all too he reappears smiling, at your elbow .... In a rare in photographic literature. busy 18restaurant he will stand up and sit down Other epistemological issues surfaced in my effort again; he has made a portrait of a man at another to know the archives as unreductively as possible. table. Perhaps the best way to demonstrate these labyrin thine loops is through the following example of But Newhall quickly moves from anecdotes to photographers discussing with one another topics of more ideological concerns.Europeans, she claims,are mutualDURING concern. THE FALL OF 1952 BEAUMONT AND NANCY interested mainly in "people,and the places and events they create around themselves," and are indifferent,if not hostile to the aesthetics and politics of many west Newhall travelled in Europe for two months to col coast photographers. lect photographs for the Eastman House. In the course of their travels, they met with many leading Aphoper The merely pretty horrifies [Cartier-Bresson]: tographers,ture, including Coburn,Strand, and Cartier "Now,landscape!" in this moment, this crisis, with the Bresson. The journey resulted in an article in world maybe going to pieces-to photograph a "Controversy and the Creative Concepts," in He has no doubt of the sincerity or which Nancy Newhall addressed what she perceived the stature of Weston or Adams or Strand,but, to be the divergent approaches of European and Amer although he feels closer to Weston,they mystify ican photographers.She begins: him; looking at their work: "Magnificent!-But I can't understand these men. It is a world of Last fall,in Paris,I found myself involved in hot stone." To the explanation that through images defense of the ideals and methods of photogra of what is as familiar to all men as stone,water, phers in the West; this spring,in San Francisco, grass, cloud, photographers can make visual 28 poetry and express thought beyond translation Weston is probably the most tolerant of the into other media: "Do they think that by photo major photographers; he expects no one to fol graphing what is eternal they make their work low his personal concept, knowing that every eternal?" The further idea that, in the American creator makes his own concept as inevitably as West, man appears trivial and civilization a tran a river makes its own course to the sea .... But sient litter: "It is, I think, philosophically un few of Weston's followers follow him in this, sound." Man to Europe and to many in the and most of them recoil at the slightest devia American East, is still the proper study of man. tion away from the concept.They cannot see an The earth, the universe, eternity?-"They are image that is not printed on cool and glossy too big, too far away. What can we do about paper; enlargement distresses them.... A mini them?"" ature camera is a toy, and its results miniscule, Life inconsequential and a nuisance to look at.People Newhall then turns briefly to American photojour seldom interest the Weston followers as subjects, nalism, which she equates largely with magazine apart from an occasional portrait . And they photographers. She discovers points in common be would rather earn their living as carpenters or tween American and European photojournalists: the masons than turn their cameras on what does troubled relations between editors and photographers, not interest them and sully their delight formere the exigencies of deadlines and space limitations, the cash. Yet with the majority of them, this rigid often rootless life-styles. She claims, however, that ity is a temporary phase; they emerge with a
"The American is much more20 versatile than his Euro- strong discipline from the silent dominance of pean colleague .. .. He is a much better technician Weston's vision, and begin to evolve their own than the European ...." Newhall suggests that this approaches. For themselves, there may be falla superiority is the result of "the so called purists" cies and limitations23 in his concept, but it still Stieglitz, Strand, Weston, Adams-who provided the stands monumental in its simplicity, a challenge and a catalyst. standards unmatched elsewhere for precision of technique and intensity of statement, standards While praising Weston's uniquely American brand of
that never fail to stagger and upset the21 European individualism, Newhall also sees in his "tolerance" a who is required to conform to them. possible solution to the controversy between Ameri Day can and European photographers that occasioned her The concluding section, comprising one-half of the essay. article,books is a sketch of Edward Weston, whose Despite Newhall's hope that "Controversy and the Newhall knew intimately since she had been ed Creative Concepts" would lead to mutual understandAper iting them for publication for several years. Like her ing,ture, at least one reader was moved in another direc portrait of Cartier-Bresson, New hall's account played tion. Soon after the publication of the article in a large role in establishing the public image of Weston Wynn Bullock wrote a letter to Nancy Newhall that is still dominant today. She recounts Weston's that set off a chain reaction of letter-writing involv first box camera, his affection for cheap lenses and ing several central figures of mid-century American simple equipment, his self-consciously spartan life photography. style, his insistence upon view-camera precision and Bullock had never met the Newhalls, although natural lighting, his reverence of the fine print. She Weston and Adams were mutual friends.According ly, balances Cartier-Bresson's credo-"Man to Europe he begins the letter expressing respect for Nancy's and to many in the American East, is still the proper criticism-"We who love photography take you with study of man"-with the Weston equivalent-"The deadly seriousness"-and ends it with the hope that proper study of man in the West22 is the powers and the N ewhalls might join him "for dinner and an eve functions of the earth, and how he may live with ning of photographic talk and pictures" when they them during his brief tenancy." next visit California.But the heart of the letter is Bul Newhall concludes the article with a discussion of lock's strong opposition to Cartier-Bresson and his Weston's character and influence. equally ardent defense of Weston's position. Bullock
29 • I •
JU Jlar Fbt• D,.1.,. 1._ co-""•tH o.Mf AotrCJd• 'tM1 tup ,,,..,.,.,,.., •rld orhh. I .V.atarer, C&J(.f•rat• b•lUH ncA •,.,,,.,• ,, • oMlJ,.g• OAd 1h/•H• agaS••t co,VW•h• ltHahr JCf, Jt,.,:I. olld NtP"1d1. It 1p1ll• ••• • •• •I HJ• had 011 Mr"lf •rt., ·""'"'.11•• IMS O ... ,... /er tA, gHd. Jlr•. lo.a•, haM.lJ J..oia..a. .UfoJ.J .,,..,.. ,. C1 do C•J ,. tP"hgb.7 •p tM J S•P. tld '"-•.J•J nou ergucnct o/ Art f'tr ,Npagoado u,raue irt J'tr Art. 1 clf,11't uoa .a.• .. .- .. ,. '1, ••• Tork polUSu.1 pNJIOJt.MO bd tM .,,., H-•MoUc t.. p, IIACd p1l1t't0 •P � Jo,., tnaffdl/, 1"tro11gtl- wo.bH1 •••• II.or lo•a,, ., ., Z A /INJ.v CHIAll,ftCff Uat ,, p"-1ogiM,Plf ,. 11 ndu,.. ell o .l ,lr,ov, ""*-' '6f; crH• a,ow ao11r U•••• 1twr uuuh tJI trtH ...... cr,u , .. 1ho11Jd be aod• IMdOlr .i .. ,. Oot, Waord'• color .. ,.,t h1 Mod•""' l'',ottgJ"OphV c»ld �ur r,cnt o,·UoJ• h A,.. ,.•• ,.. �H tpMrrH •• l•to uu.,.. u, t11p• o/ 1wbJ1ot aii11·,r h th proptr HbJtot •I ,,.... ,,.., .... Nrot 1 "°"* kt r•,•�• M• ,.,.,.1"d oad l�l•HU&l 1 Uld h ,.,.,. ,..J• •l o1"U1o. ro,u·• h ••• •I ••• r'ON NSoH •�• t'1�,'¼-o��,.4:�:i!f!!*� �-�•1;a�i'7:J!l"'- ,. pHpl• Pd tMSr Sl\fJ•111u &1 to � nct•rt., oad oaorcwt art., :ti·t!!'.:: :!I::.�,./�:�,���!,..C111::: ::::::�!:: :;.. '::. U /It tubJIOtl J'tr Uc O ..fnl• ..... dtscUi,i ••,., ...... It G CHiJJIAI pGhU•,g ... 1 ... '""* ...... U du.Jo ._.. l l Clll4 nit •SO iA• perao• .,._•Cl , U •• tAf t1Jbl11' 1 0 0 ?� f bus.'��P:!!: :f !. 1!:�:•;.::.:4'�!.�'4:-':;.!if,!:Ji r ! !.�:;�:!:!: ;,r-:.r 1 1 .U N c,.oic, t/ tdJ,ct .0U1r 1"4 l
Pages one and two of carbon copy of letter from Wynn Bullock to Nancy Newhall, 16 November 1953 Wynn Bullock Archive suggests that photojournalists have "long waged a edies of the world just because he photographs relentless fight against those of us who believe in the a landscape. importance of 8x10 contact photography," and re The spiritual character of [Weston's] seeing gards Cartier-Bresson's views on Weston and other can be his answer to the confusion and hatreds west coast photographers as an especially aggravating that keep fermenting world crisis.I believe such case in point. "seeing" is a challenge and defense against con fusion and hatreds. It spells out a way of life What I object most violently is [Cartier based on hard work, sacrifice and a search for Bresson's] nose in the air attitude towards those the good. to of us who find rocks, water, grass, and the world Actually all Bresson is doing is bringing up of nature equally fitting subjects for great pho the limp old argument of Art for Propaganda tography. To me this absurd attitude is clearly versus Art for Art.I don't mean political propa spelled out when you quote Bresson as saying, ganda but the more commendable type which "Now, in this tnoment, this crisis, with the points up human joy, tragedy, strength, weak world going to pieces,-to photograph a LAND ness .... SCAPE." He sounds like a jittery old woman. I Any type of subject matter is the proper sub suppose Edward is any less sensitive to the trag- ject of photography.For it is what is done to subject
30 potentially a fine photographer; I hope that when - 3 - she says what she has to say in critical writings
prcf,ut .1., 1t she will then do some photography! 1 >.,dr 110. r:d ., ,,.,. l'r.,.b tM1 or, ci,a1nQ' to CaJl/oMlfll HOii. l ltio;c tlf 01111 pd M:ctMr •Ull lr•tt, llod&,' ,111 ld-.r-rd ,,1 It• h!Hll The world is very large. C[ artier-]B[ resson], 1'1101'$' . 1/ cc,,aM11hr.t I muld JU·• �• l'rou, Jf&f ov,r for dfn,i,,. 011d W[ynn] B[ullock], Adams, Hill, Zilch; all have on 01111,ig •I plle1o;J"Orltlc tolt a.ltd rCohru. the potential for some kind of statement. There is not the time for the bistro type of arguments. The energy you spent in your letter might well have produced a fine photograph! The energy / have spent in this letter might well have pro duced a fine photograph! Think of all the fine photographs that might have been done, if only the energies had been directed towards the mi raculous revelation of the lens, instead of the often un-miraculous manifestation of the criti cal spirit! We all need a breath of really freshair, a flash of confidence in the Thing which resides within each of us. It actually makes no differ ence at all what C-B says-what Nancy says What I say, or what you say-in words. That funny unflat thing which peels offthe drying
racks is what we really say. 25
Adams sent a copy of his letter to Beaumont New hall, who also felt obliged to come to Nancy's and Cartier-Bresson's defense. Striking a more moderate tone than Adams, he suggested that Bullock's
reaction to (Nancy's] report of the French atti tude toward photography is a tribute to her skill Page three as a writer. She carefully avoided any editorial comment on the various views which she has described. I think it is very important to realize matter that is of prime importance. To limit a pho that C-B finds a landscape a sterile yield. Once tographer's vision to only those things that in we understand his conviction on this matter we clude people and their influence is to falsely min do not expect to find great landscapes in his imize nature, and abstract art, as fit subjects for work. On the other hand, the fact that Ansel the camera. finds his greatest expression in wilderness un
ls a Cezanne painting any less great because it touched by man is equally important to realize. 26 deals with a bowl of apples and not the person who puts it on the table? No! No! No! 24 The now well-thumbed Bullock letter was in turn passed on to Minor White, who had recently joined Upon receipt of Bullock's letter, Nancy Newhall, the staff of the George Eastman House. As the editor who was in San Francisco at the time, shared the letter of Aperture, White made no attempt to conceal his with Ansel Adams and sent a copy to Beaumont in irritation. Rochester. Adams got offthe first salvo, writing to Bullock, Dear Ansel, GRRRRRR I think it is time for all of us to say less, write less, argue less, and photograph more. Nancy is Just read Wynn's letter and your reply.
31 How are we ever going to make Aperture aforum
A!f!El •DAMi UI 14TH AYU'IUl SU 11oe1sco ti for thoughts and ideas if we tell people to stop �--rl,IIU writing their ideas and go make pictures? I don't -·- get it . ...,� fQl,lZf'1alllttel'. ••&Nalila--�JIIOtoapoM. Tltia l.1Ni9 �anl�toauof-. t:11mw•wwwrtt1J'OIG,. 1 27 ..... olrDlilN�MlnlJN , .... adla.rtCl,&dlObaft..... U6,4caalKlwlll wUbpaft1d ...... �to�"""'''111111 ,-.. b - ,, lllll&4llllaa b ....�.. ,__,.....,..lkJt �. l , .., tlllll Later in the same letter White scolds Adams for wt.clbt•.,.... tblclu� encouraging Nancy to take up photography at the n;iorta utW'• naoau,-abao,alrncb�C'-'""li... �--�&Mr.llclp,NIII eee. Maa.nootta ....,..._��..w�w u11w.�. 1 expense of her writing . o&Uabpo:sat:- na ao-..ft:>...... � OH1re1o lad,. upec111d � u �u Rmey, • nYll Miitour.-. ooatue 1'1111 �la • lllawb.MapUt,olaUtla1adU A• [The top level critic] must be able, so far as p;t,dl ,lWMIMtn�lltJ:Jr:.taclblf/��lt.w�--�-�- 'a:ee4&10t NP"Jllll•U ._,..-,;a.u.tQndwwma.Ml4taF(ld�I humanly possible, to see ALL photography as 1'1'H'Go�al6'...... ·--- 1 t ..ft a L.l&U omustMU.. Iliaft IO__,.. IO ...-, Du 1111.la a whole; see where its parts fit; have no blind . :.VO�, ... wDUlONflD....,.ttllit UullMudlord. UHU. nvdla•Ua.N.U.elU•UIIMl0am::oaufloeldol� wtt* lb:ttflel .....pl'Ollle:Ma II,&� GIUl:Xof a�nuka NJ lllfflF aanca. spots; be sympathetic to any visual image.... hopU _, 1111801.,_.,.,...... a'ldlMlf, ...... ,�_....,, Nancy is reaching this ideal. And it is an ideal .tU 'f� .. .,.. a,l' ...... --,.ct. ..anpeen .. l. li..ffU'd--.drnll7appftCla.tlldsia•MU:.1' :U4Cl,Jb.. n.lJu'uta&: ncr;,al� 11111! al ... w1Niml la�world.lb.2lallb la Cbl that you as a practicing artist, as a practicing Nit, _.�NUaJ ....• an .,._ u» w..p '.CWu'il nellJwu&a IIIS t&adl ud.U. 'wtlO&ttiaotlxbb"lall•IO�i..:t, creative photographer can not afford to hold. a.e.t,tD.mll .. U fm'&llduto_,.� n1Ll�, at'IMI.-, ..S But, and here is all I ask, give her a chance to �.�:=::�r-=�:::==:- grow in HER direction. Give her courage and the help she needs to rise to her own stature.28
A few days later White wrote Bullock directly.
Nancy sent us your letter about Cartier, and want permission to publish the pertinent parts --· in the next issue of Aperture. A defense of Ed
aeuNNabralllflrdllftnelllW', afla.daet�lllb.lTlllac ward's viewpoint is much needed. I hope that wllk2l n11J1;:1u� wWaaeacbol 11 ad:l:&UJ c:aDa • � Ill au'11!:11:t evuar-�..,..ad .. 11aae, _.,.. •1at ta,, w ..mt pa cs, - Ansel's little letter (of which I saw a copy) only la.,,.. 'naattm117.....nat&b 1dddt.pntedflh:idr)'taenctale...i •nau,-, spurred you to write him a nasty one back. How aqtA IIIU Utsa. l llope b _,. I..._.totalkwlGaJ":JQs:.ioa. , we are to run a forum forphotographers if they ___ _ don't take an hour fromthe darkroom to pound at the typewriter I'll never understand. 29
Despite this far-flung correspondence, there is no record of Nancy Newhall herself having responded to Bullock's letter, which is especially noteworthy since she considered it important enough to share with Beaumont, Adams, White, and perhaps others. Of course, a letter could have been written and subse quently misplaced, although Bullock saved most of his correspondence, and Newhall often kept carbon copies of hers. Since she was in San Francisco at this time, she may have spoken directly to the nearby Bul lock about it over the telephone, thereby leaving no record of their exchange.Or perhaps she was angered by Bullock's letter and decided against responding. For the moment, suffice it to say that any explana tion we create for Newhall's "lapse" in replying to Bullock's letter must be highly qualified. The "per Pages one and two of carbon copy of letter from haps's" and "maybe's" that such anomalies necessitate Ansel Adams to Wynn Bullock, 1 December 1953 Ansel Adams Archive 32 GEORGE EASTMAN HOUSE endures large doses of simple drudgery, for which RIK/min- 7, N. Y. there arebecause no assurances of rainbows, much less pots of December 11, 1953 gold. Accordingly, T choose to analyze these exchanges in part of their ordinariness, for the problems
Mr. Wynne Bullock such exchanges present to researchers are much more 155 Mar VlataDrive Monterey. California representative than events like Yalta. Dear Wynne: Although the terms of the preceding letters seem BeaWDODt balMleclme a Utilepile of yourprints and told me to make a .- of them. It waa refreablngand dellgbtfulto clear and straightforward, underlying them are sub aee them, 1om.e newones, oo prlatine wblte mo\Dlta, and with Iba charmand lnteulty I have learned to look for In rosa idiosyncrasies, motives, and issues-a labyrinth :,oar work. that is implicitly pointed to by the defensive quality Bo while BeaWDODt aa1d be bad atuck � neck out, I don't mind. l'tnt reaction wu to dlaplay Diemalong with com of the documents themselves. The words "defend" ment bJ m1aell, and otter Iba public, •one man'•optnlona to one man•o pbototrapbo,• or aome auch wanunc. lf I do, and "defensive" recur throughout. Nancy Newhall l'll beaure toaend you a copy of text. Just wheo I get to Iba job ta another matter, but a fortnight I hope. sets the tone in her first sentence by recounting how Nancy aent u your letter about Cartier, and I want per in Paris and then in San Francisco she had "heatedly mtaaJon to pabltah the pertinent parts Inthe next taaue of APERTURE. A defeue of Edw&rd'• viel'P(llnt ta much needed. I bope that Anael 'a little letter (ofwbicb I aaw a defended" one group of photographers to the other. copy) only apW'red youto write b1m a nasty one back. Bow we are to run a forum br pbotographera If they don't Bullock attacked Cartier-Bresson by way of defend tau an b CEORCE EA�TMAN HOUSE ,OOUI A .•• , R;,rl.11�1 ,.._ l bulc c..,cepta are cl•rly accepted, ud we ere able to l»cember I, llt3 •PFKlala0.. complelalJ dlfferont wrlllnc ol, •J S. S. Cvmm!Dp and John Stolnbeck. article baa prmoked 10 IIIIUIJ llr. 'IV:,m,t Bullock �1..�J:!lf:}�i:a:.;'::� 155 Mar V\11&Orlff Monterey, California With all -t wlabetl, Dear Wym,e BallDcll: YounllncorelJ, Pleu•accept mJ apoloclff for tbe delaJ la auw•rlnl :,oar ' 11; -ri,� letter about Ille article on oolarlatlca wblcb JOU ban II-. pHrowo • �f:ti:,,rr.:�1a����·�-�':r!"t1as. BN/jw I ban alwa71 Wldentood that the labatuer .Uec:t wae dae =\J:to upooure to u,i,t olthenultln -terlal dw'tnc denlop ment, while true oolarlatton wae caued on,._,.. IO tons that th• 1boltlder ol tile cbaraclarleUc c11n1 leued. Thie ellect a_r, In platimlm prlnto ud In daporr�. It wae thla dlatlnctlon wblch I bad In mind wbabJ l 1"llfflld the article. �::,:1!,��� .Mrr.!:c�ti.:!:: r!�...... 1r' 1 T �,:i:: W :::�� !!:3�� �;:J:o': :.�- :!11:�:.ki'!t� t: Eastman BOUH andI automatle&llJ oubmlt to him artlcl• ol a toclm.lcal utur• wblch we publlall la!!!!I!· Minor White la now work!JIIwith u. Be wtll put the pboto- 1 on r ·::1 i::..lnc�e:,: .. � ,.:u,'"' time we ha.,. kept J'OW' pbotoaraplla. "° 0 !����tha��.!,�•��- ai!t ·y:::f:-bJ ::�:,: �;"'�� port ot the French att!Nde toward llbotoKn,pby la a tribute to her allW u a writer. Ill•�1i: caretulf7 awkled any editorial commeot on the n.rloua •lew1 11blch Iba baa deacrlbed. I thlnll Itl1 nry Important9:'r to reallae that Cartler·Br flndo landacape a 1terll1 rtald. Once we anderotud hie con- r !:� : �.::r ;::. =-�.«:i!�fi:\i::;, f:f: hie sr•t•t aproulon to wlldeme1, untouched t,y 1111U1 la equailJ Important to realise. II Uteratur, theae dl(f11r111t E..111e ., M,..,,_ C, ,,� t.1,..1,. Si Pr-.,r, ,,., Al1 ..J ,., • o,f Pk l'4f'J to Pages one and two of original typescript letter from Beaumont Newhall Wynn Bullock, 9 December 1953 Wynn Bullock Archive without favoritism. "J(' Beaumont Newhall reiterates And in 1948 Newhall wrote to Adams concerningan Nancy's claim of neutrality, writing to 31Bullock that ideaCamera that Work. they had discussed for some time: starting a she "carefully avoided any editorial comment on the new journal to take up the slack of the long-defunct various views which she has described. " The article, Camera Work however, clearly reflects Nancy's personal background and professional interests. was monumental in its time; let us As noted earlier, the close relationship between make something, independent but related, as Adams and the Newhalls was forged in part through monumental in our time; Stieglitz fought for their mutual regard for Stieglitz. During the war years photography as art and for art and artists; let's us Nancy Newhall spent hundreds of hours with Stieg to go further in our time, as beautifully presented, litz, helping him with the day-to-day work32 of291 and as intense, of equal quality, taking photography conducting extensive interviews that were form as art forgranted in many subtle ways and fight the basis for a biography of Stieglitz. On many oc ing what to us now are more vital issues-the casions Adams and Newhall wrote of their commit problems of photography34 as expression, profes ment to carrying on.Stieglitz's work and ideas. Adams, sion, communication. for example, wrote to Nancy a few days afterStieglitz's death that 33 Although Newhall establishes a contrast between I am subdued by the weight of our obligation. America and Europe in her article, there is an equally We asked for it; we have lived towards it. important contrast between photography as it was 34 practiced on the two American coasts, a theme that d'art. This concern surfaces in a seemingly neutral can still be found in photographic criticism. Nancy, passage on Edward Weston's current activities. though a born-and-bred easterner, was increasingly interested in west coast photography.In the late forties ... with the help of his son, Brett, [Edward and early fifties she worked with Edward Weston edit Weston] is printing the thousand negatives he ing his Daybooks, began researching a biography of considers the best. There will be eight prints Adams (The Eloquent Light), and developed close from each; from albums, museums, collectors friendships with Dorothea Lange, Cedric Wright, and and individuals can choose and order by nega Brett Weston. During these years her correspondence tive number what they wish.Probably no more with Adams often dwelled on schemes that would startling idea was ever proposed to museums, allow the Newhalls to move permanently to the West traditionally conditioned to the small output of Coast: As early as 1945, Nancy regarded living in the painters and the high cost of even a slight sketch. east more as a duty than a desire. Referring to the For the price of one so-so contemporary piece Museum of Modern Art and the city that housed it, of painting or sculpture, the entire masterwork Nancy wrote Adams that of one of the greatest photographers is for sale. And for less than a bad watercolor or scratchy If, by expending three or fourye ars more in this etching, the massive and sculptural images of a joint, this madhouse, these gasoline fume-filled man who could write, with a laugh, "The paint canyons of cement, we establish photography ers have no copyright on modern art!" and photographers in several fields with enough 37 momentum so that they will go on gathering The case could be made that the rhetorical vectors force, then you and the school, Edward [Weston] in "Controversy and the Creative Concepts" reach on his hill-everybody is going to benefit .... their culmination at precisely this point in the essay, a There will be revolutions and counterrevolu point that obviously would be applauded by virtually tions, gorgeous and ridiculous undertakings all of Aperture's readers.However, the passage con the thing will be alive.35 tradicts the air of neutrality adopted at the beginning of the essay. Not only are the issues raised in it irrel By the time she travelled to Europe in 1952, New evant to the conflicting stances of "European" and hall's personal and professional interests were strongly "American " photography, which is the main focus of centered in the West, just as they were for many of the article, but also the case in point is the work of Stieglitz's other latter-day disciples. 3(, an American, Edward Weston, while no similar prop Newhall's allegiance to west coast photography is ositions are made for the collectibility of European ,evident throughout the essay. American photography photography. is largely equated with landscape photography in the Critical objectivity, and how it is affected by a f/64 mode; even American photojournalism, Newhall writer's relationships with artists, is a central issue suggests, was greatly influenced by "the so-called here. Close associations between critics and photog purists-Stieglitz, Strand, Weston, Adams." The sec raphers were virtually inevitable during the early fif tion on Weston takes up the last half of the article, and ties, when the emerging photographic community the fact that the essay concludes by stressing Weston's was still very small, and even in today's expanded art influence is hardly an accident: like any good writ world such associations are commonplace. Though er, Newhall recognized the relationship between the positive in many ways, these relationships can also organization of an essay and its rhetorical effective contribute to hidden agendas that are. unknown to ness.The length and placement of the Weston section most readers, but that nonetheless shape the tenor eclipses the much briefer section on Cartier-Bresson, and substance of essays or reviews. Critics play a to say nothing of the numerous east coast photogra major role in establishing the visibility, value, and phers who were never even mentioned, much less marketability of an artist's work. Accordingly, diffi analyzed, in the article. cult ethical problems arise when the critic and the In addition to giving pride of place to the west artist also are close personal friends, or, for that mat coast axis in photography, Newhall used her article to ter, enemies. A conscientious critic can, at least in promote the status of photographs as collectible objets theory, achieve balance by sorting out personal dimen- 35 not s10ns from the issues raised in the work itself. And among Cartier-Bresson's biggest fans. In fact, both too, a critic can always choose to write if balance Newhalls had tried to change Adams's negative opin is not forthcoming.In any event, the problem of neu ion of the French photographer, as well as his less trality was one that Nancy Newhall confronted often than-positive attitude about EuropeThe Decisivein general. Moment,While in her career, since much of her writing concerned still in Paris, Beaumont wrote to Adams of his high photographers who were also close personal friends. regard for Cartier-Bresson's Insofar as it is possible to separate the two, her inter which had just been published: ests lay not so much in promoting individual photog raphers but rather the statusAperture, of photography itself. We think that it is superb; the best presentation This agenda was wholly consistent with the objectives of his work.... I wish that I could make you 38 that led to the creation of a subject we will see what I see inCartier. return to momentarily. Despite the strong pro-Weston slant in "Contro Nancy wrote on the next day: versy and the Creative Concepts," Wynn Bullock apparently believed that Weston needed more vigor There could not be two photographers so fast, ous defense.Bullock had for some time made his liv so intense, of such integrity and intelligence, so ing fromcommercial work and his photographic con utterly opposite in everything else as you and cession at Fort Ord military base.He had only recently Henri! If you don't feel his world, no more can ventured into art photography, and he was interested he feel yours39 .... A comparison between you in his work reaching the broadest possible audience. and Henri ... could be very funny and highly Although in the early fifties art photographers could illuminating. not support themselves through print sales, there was clamoring, as always, among younger photographers Such graphic differences were the driving forces be to get their work shown and recognized.Throughout hind Nancy's article.Indeed, she may have had Adams his career Bullock openly claimed that Weston had in mind as much as Weston, but focused on the latter exerted the strongest influence on his work and think out of deference to his seniority and greater influence. ing. To Bullock's mind, an attack on Weston was Adams responded: tantamount to an attack on himself and his working philosophy; thus, his letter arose from his personal Believe me, my inability to see what you see in feelings about Weston as well as from his efforts to Cartier-Bresson's work is MY fault-not his.It further his own career.This is not to gainsay Bul is a whole complex internal pattern and concept; lock's genuine regard for Weston, but only to suggest my lack of interest in things unless they do that other motives were involved as well. Indeed, something besides present themselves ... my Bullock might have realized that this was a good lack of interest in photographs which show a opportunity to make initial contact with the Newhalls, world which means little to me (people as just who were more than a little influential in curatorial people-especially proletariopeople-havc no ac and critical circles. tual existence for me (the camera seems40 to create Perhaps surer of himself and of his footing in pho a special race of humanoids which (n]ever seems tography, Ansel Adams didn't mince words in his to exist anywhere but in the prints!) response to Bullock's letter. But it is amusing to hear Adams, who by 1953 had written several books, doz Adams's critique ofCartier-Bresson's pictures is in ens of articles, and countless letters, telling Bullock to part a recapitulation of Bullock's position, although cut the verbiage and stay in the darkroom. Adams his half-serious Red-baiting and misanthropy arc denounced words as irrelevant, yet in writing his let touches unique to Adams.Nonetheless, there are sig ter to Bullock he used them against themselves.In so nificant differences between Adams's exchanges with doing, Adams joined the ever-expanding lists of writ the Newhalls and with Bullock. Adams admonishes ers who decry linguistic labyrinths even as they con Bullock, stressing the primacy of work over critical tinue to create them. patter, while failing to mention his own antipathy to Adams's gentle chiding of Bullock is ironic for Cartier-Bresson. But to the Newhalls he emphasizes another reason, smce Adams himself was hardly different ways of making and regarding photographs, 36 and strikes a slightly self-admonishing pose in the pro Adams's ideas muddled, and kiddingly wrote in one cess. While the issues spurring both letters were re letter that "we43 are probably going to come to blows" markably similar, the contexts of the letters were not, over them. Adams, for his part, found White vague and in this instance the contexts seem pivotal. Adams and elusive. had been a close associate and defender of Edward Weston since the early 1930s, while Bullock, through Your thoughts float like gossamer on the breeze no fault of his own, was a relative newcomer. In the of feeling; some snag on the tree of fact, others early 1950s, Adams may well have viewed Bullock as float and float and f I o a t ...4• something of an upstart. And too, perhaps Adams had an easier time launching into Bullock than his There were also differences in teaching methods. older friends, the Newhalls. As noted earlier in this White, as early as the late forties, approached pho essay, different audiences bring out different sides of tographs with unabashed subjectivity, viewing them a correspondent, and nowhere is this clearer than in as expressions of deep inner states in which sexuality these two very different letters by Ansel Adams. was often prominent.Adams was not normally given In some ways the most interesting relationship to metaphysical musings in the classroom and was implicit in these letters is between Ansel Adams and skeptical of such interpretations .But in the main, nei Minor White. Both men were brought together ther man let his differences overshadow their mutual through the agency of the Newhalls. After the war interests. Though they were often at odds with one White came to New York, where he worked under another, both used humor to leaven their differences. Beaumont Newhall at the Museum of Modern Art. As James Baker Hall recounts, "At parties and around White was something of a coup for the Newhalls, school [White] and Adams ... dealt with their dif both because he was sympathetic with their views of ferences at times by baiting45 one another affectionately, photography and because they had long lobbied for to the students' delight." an assistant at the Modern.But soon after White's Nonetheless, Adams became increasingly pessimis arrival, Steichen was appointed director of the Mod tic about White's performanceat the school.He wrote ern's Photography Department, and Newhall, after to the Newhalls while they were in Paris that agonizing over the prospect of working under Stei chen, finally resigned.Less than a week later, Nancy ...Minor is inflexible. He is now writing a Newhall wrote to Adams that 'manual' on the Zone System, which-honestly -(what I've seen of it) is fareliminati11g more complex than Steichen already is after the one person we've my statement ....Minor MUST control all. He started to train-Minor White. Minor unde seems to spend a lot of time influences cided. Wants to continue photographing.. .. 41 (including mine) rather than creating them.Most think you could use him at the [CaliforniaSchool of the students are dissatisfied.The enrollment of Fine Arts] if he decided against Steichen?" is alarmingly low. I have46 grave fears of some catastrophe happening. White soon realized, as Nancy Newhall put it, that under Steichen "he would not be working with Pho42 The "catastrophe" occurred some months later when tography as Art but Photographyen route as Illustration." White resigned from the school under circumstances White turned down the offer to continue at the mu that remain obscure. Apparently Adams did not play seum, and soon after he was to San Francisco a direct role in White's dismissal, since he wrote to to teach with Adams, whom he had never met. Nancy: I was told Adams and White, though similar in many respects, were very different individuals in others. They en Confidential until I confirm; [my em gaged in prolonged debates about various photo phasis] that Minor is out of the school; could graphic and philosophical issues, frequently finding not adjust to current 4situations.7 Am not sur each other's ideas hard to understand, much less ac prised, but I am sorry. cept. After working together for over three years at the California School of Fine Arts (later to become Later in 1953, White moved to Rochester, where he the San Francisco Art Institute), White still found worked at the George Eastman House under Beau- 37 50 mont Newhall. Adams and White parted on amiable raphy. The appearance of the first Cameranumber Work. was but strained terms. greeted with considerable enthusiasm by all parties. All of this helps to explain the intensity of White's Here, they hoped, was the successor to response to Adams's letter to BullockAperture:. Upon reading However, the initial euphoria quickly diminished. By Adams's letter to Bullock, White believed that Adams June of 1952, beforeAperture. the second issue had even ap was undermining the agenda for that·it be peared, Nancy and Adams exchanged increasingly an open forum for serious photography. White'sAperture, let anxious letters about Predictably, the finances ter to Bullock, in which he asked permission to ex of the fledgling journal were a problem. But they cerpt part of Bullock's letter to Adams in were equally concerned about Minor White exercis functioned not only( Aperture as "a 2:defense 3) of Edward's view ing too much editorial control, a criticism that was to point" but as a rejoinder to Adams himself. However, follow him throughout his career as editor, teacher, in the next issue a portfolio of Bullock's and curator. Nancy Newhall worried that work appeared, along with a statement of Bullock's philosophy, but no section of the letter was reproduced all our names are on this; it represents us. It after all. Perhaps White thought the statement of Bul MUST NOT turn into an epicene, thin, esoteric, lock's philosophy was more effective and appropriate thin wristed young man avant garde rag. I love than an excerpt from the letter. Or, perhaps White's MinorAperture but we would be blind if we refused to initial request for printing rights was made in the heat see he has tendencies in that direction.... Tell of anger at Adams, and during the intervening months him 51 has got to have all of life in it. The he changed his raisonmind ford'etrepolitical Aperture reasons. whole force of creative photography should be The larger context for these exchanges lies in the behind it. formation and of itself. Adams, the Newhalls, and White were in touch steadily AdamsAperture responded: throughout the fifties, discussing48 various schemes for furthering art photography. Their letters reveal the is going to be a MESS if you don't step inner workings of a group in the process of defining in. Minor has a basic resentment of my 'practi itself and its goals, as well as dramatize how private cability.' If it isn't obscure and personal it ain't concerns and public discourse arc inextricably con art! We have warm personal52 feelings but no real nected. While Adams, the Newhalls, and White are sympathy in viewpoint. presently regarded as highly influentialfigures, in the Aperture early fifties they rightly considered themselves a mi ThatCamera White imposedWork his own personality and val nority and their cause an unpopular one. They were ues upon is undeniable, much as the entire in many respects different people with divergent goals run of bears the stamp of Alfred Stieg and priorities, and the same could be said of Dorothea litz. It was the degree of White's control that most Lange, Paul Strand, Barbara Morgan, Wynn Bullock, worried the journal's founders. Their concern was and others. What these photographers shared was a significant enough that in 1954 Adams and Nancy strong commitment to the promotion and expansion Newhall spearheaded an abortive drive to dissolve of art photography. Although they never issued forthAp the journal. Although White shared with the other manifestos,erture or called themselves "j/128" or "Post founders the goal of promoting photography's status Secessionists," their zeal was nonetheless intense. as an expressive and legitimate art, he was more head was toAperture become the principal mechanism for strong than some would have liked, and his tastes furthering the cause. 49 frequently were radically different from those of the Although was founded in 1952, the jour other founders. For example, White supported and nal had been discussed in the abstract for many years published the work53 of Frederick Sommer in spite of by Adams and the Newhalls. In 1945, Adams urged the strong antipathy that Adams and both Newhalls Beaumont, recently returned from the Army Air felt toward it. To their minds, Sommer's pictures Corps, to "produce the journal that we have talked incorporated neither54 beauty nor spirit, but instead about so long," one which would espouse the "hu dwelt in darker, surrealistic realms for which they man, spiritual, and emotional" elements in photog- felt little affinity. 38 Despite their somewhat rocky hjstory, Adams's deep the traces the one leaves upon the structure and White's disagreements centered more on style of the other.S<, They are, like body and soul, in than substance, means rather than ends. Theirs was a divisible, but they have no common aim or rivalry built largely on an identical claim, for by the meaning. early fifties each viewed himself as heir to the mantle of their common mentor, Stieglitz. The "Equivalents" A full analysis of the connections between the doc photographs, and Stieglitz's gnomic comments about uments under discussion and the historical and politi them, were especially important to those in the Adams cal realms that framed them is far beyond the reach of Newhalls-White axis. Whereas early Stieglitz follow this essay. But some of these relationships can be ers like Strand saw their mission mainly in terms of suggested, if only sketchily, by returning again to promoting photography as an art, latter-day disciples Bullock's remarks on Cartier-Bresson. Bullock's po like Adams and White were just as attracted to the lemic gives eloquent, if ironic support to Nancy New claims Stieglitz made for the emotional and spiritualAper hall's depiction of both camps. potentialture of the medium. These differentbut comple mentary thrusts were the founding principles of Convinced of its own passionate logic, each and the generation of photographers that it en group refuses to believe the other has any logic couraged and published. White took Stieglitz's idea at all, and condemns its philosophy, or its sub of equivalence into mystical directions, which evolved ject matter,57 or its technique, or its motives, or into a highly personalized amalgam of Zen Buddhism, its concepts in toto as full of error and headed astrology, and the teachings ofGurdjieff Adams's sen for limbo. sibility, as reflected both in his aesthetics and his pho tography, is an extension of mid-nineteenth-century Bullock blends two prototypically American attri American Tr anscendentalism wherein God (or Emer butes, formalism and individualism, as he echoes the son's "Over Soul") is most evident not in man, but in thinking of Stieglitz, Weston, and others in the Mod Nature. Both men came to see photography as a means ernist tradition. The subject matter itself is unimpor both of expressing inner states and effectingincreased tant; what matters is how it is photographed accord emotional and spiritual awareness. Adams often waxed ing to the artist's unique sensibility. For Bullock, rhapsodic about the spiritual connections between pho whatever political praxis photography possesses is a tography and music, while White saw photography55 function of the phQtographer's "hard work, sacrifice, as "a way" towards a state of consciousness that tran and a search for the good," a view which depicts the scended photography and physical life itself. ideal photographer as a cross between Socrates and That these ideas took hold in the 1950s was, of Ahab. The photographer pits himself against recalci course, hardly coincidental. As always, aesthetic is trant reality and emerges with an individualized, "spir sues and styles have a direct relationship to the culture itual" vision that functions as an "answer to the con at large, although it is normally difficult to glimpse fusion and hatreds" of the world. The answer to social these connections as they occur, or even, as in the and political ills, then, lies not in action-in-the-world, present case, at thirty years removed. The late Arnold but in retreat into the inner sanctums of mind and Hauser succinctly expressed the interconnections be consciousness fromwhich transformative images will tween art and society, as well as the difficulties in emerge. volved in recognizing them. Cartier-Bresson, as seen through Nancy Newhall, is no less French in his attitudes. Even at this early The fact on one hand that society influences art, stage in his career, Cartier-Bresson had witnessed the and on the other that art influencessociety does kind of third-world poverty that had no counterpart not mean that a change in one corresponds to a on the Monterey peninsula. Like other Europeans, he change in the other. Art and society exist as two saw at close hand the ravages of war and its aftermath djscrete, though not necessarily isolated, reali and experienced the advent of Stalinism and the tra ties side by side with each other. They neither vails of post-World War II European politics. The fate correspond to nor contradict each other; they of humanity, then, preoccupied him, while the con neither divide nor unite each other, however templative tradition of west coast landscape photog- 39 raphy seemed unconscionably luxurious, isolationist knowing. Scholarship, particularly when it moves and apolitical. beyond straightforward facts and ponders conscious Cartier-Bresson's critique may also reflect the gen ness, influences, creative sources, and cultural milieu, eral French resentment of their American "liberators," is an activity rife with guesswork and speculation.As a feeling that grew all the more intense with the advent Justin Kaplan, the biographer of Tw ain and Whitman, of the Marshall Plan which, as one American historian suggests recently wrote, The writer starts off with a number of givens ...was the master stroke of American diplo birth and death, education, ambition, conflict, macy. Disguising economic imperialism as anti milieu, work, relationship, accident. He shapes Communism, the ERP [European Recovery them into a book that has the autonomous vital Plan] solidified Western Europe under the58 Amer ity of any work of the imagination and at the ican economic umbrella and isolated the Soviet same time is "true to life" and true to history.In Union and its East European countries. many respects biography is a feat of illusionism, sleight-of-hand, levitation; basic decisions and And too, as he sipped wine with the Newhalls in a interpretations that appear to be the results of Parisian cafc, perhaps Cartier-Bresson could not re cautious deliberation are often made instanta sist the time-honored French tradition of poking fun neously in, and as part of, the act of writing; and at the earnest Americans. for at least one moment each day the writer may59 In 1952, the world was "going to pieces" formany feel like Mark Tw ain's titled charlatans putting Europeans in ways that were simply incomprehensi on a performance of "The Royal Nonesuch. " ble to most Americans, with our expanding economy and booming babies. The "exchange" between Bul Academic conventions and safeguards can never coun lock and Cartier-Bresson is not just a clash between terbalance the serendipitous aspects of research and different individuals, or different kinds of subject mat writing. But few writers share these kinds of prob ter, or conflicting theories that buttress each photog lems with their readers. Authors usually closet their rapher's approach to picture-making. Rather, the po qualifications in the preface, and whatever humility sitions espoused by Cartier-Bresson, Bullock, and they invoke has evaporated by the end of the first the other letter-writers reflect two different historical chapter, replaced by a posture of neutrality, if not in and cultural realities. This is the case, as well, for the dubitable authority. Such postures obviously serve west coast/landscape/metaphoric vs.cast coast/urban the interests of writers, but readers are left with the /metonymic dichotomy implicit throughout New impressions that the raw materials somehow arranged Ihall's HAVE article TRIED and TO the MAKE exchange THE itFOREGOING provoked. ANALYSIS and wrote themselves. It is essential to recognize the limits of research and scholarship, not only because too many readers bestow exaggerated authority upon thorough and responsible; to be fair to the men and "authorities," but because we must recognize the lim women involved; to earn the trust of the reader by its of the particular medium of exchange to under marshalling evidence; and to organize a large amount stand any act of communication. of material into a readable format. I have followed The scholar is restricted in part by the limits inher time-honored dictates of academic research and writ ent in the materials. It is easy to lose sight of the fact ing, including getting the facts straight, documenting that personal letters, for example, are rather extraor my sources, and correlating different points of view. dinary communiques.A letter is a snapshot of a mind Various authorities have read this essay, supporting momentarily frozenthrough and in language, a mind or questioning my observations, and recommending which, upon completion of a thought, moves back improvements. In short, all of the conventional safe into the unarticulated realms of everyday existence. guards have been taken with this essay. Like a photograph, a letter is made through time, but And yet, the primary sources themselves and the time is subtracted from its premises. With a photo stance that any researcher adopts toward them sug graph, we speculate about what lay beyond the bor gest the limitations not only of this analysis, but of ders of the image; with a letter, we guess at the reali any work of scholarship and, by extension, any act of ties, mundane or otherwise, that went unstated. Some 40 of these contexts can be partially established through dead and unable to confirm or deny. the letter-writer's own testimony and careful scholar Even someone who knew both men well in 1952 ship. But, however informed or educated our infer could not finally disclaim the GRRRRRRRRRR/ ences, the contexts that generated letters remain un MEEEEOOOOWWW hypothesis, since no one else certain, and our interpretations subject to error. was present during their one-on-one encounters. First It is often difficult enough to extrapolate reliable hand accounts like memoirs and autobiographies of information from letters written by my own friends ten raise as many questions as they resolve. Memories and family. But to deal with letters written decades are usually distorted, especially when modified by before my birth, by people whom I never knew, only hindsight. (In 1974 it was hard to find anyone who exacerbated the problems. I read letters chronologi voted for Richard Nixon in 1972.) And autobiogra cally, January through December, year after year. phies, directed as they are toward posterity, are re With prolific letter-writers like Adams and Nancy plete with self-justifying strategies. Few memoirists Newhall, I could get through six months in the morn depict themselves as Rosencrantz or Guildenstern, ing and another six months after lunch: one year's mere accessories to the events on center stage. Rather, worth of letters, postmarked San Francisco or New one gets the impression that they witnessed all the York or Paris, dated 1939 or 1946 or 1957, read and crucial turning points. Boswell, for example, often consumed in a single Tucson day in 1983, punctuated gives the impression of omniscience, even though he by a ham sandwich and too many cups of coffee. didn't meet Samuel Johnson until 1763, when Johnson When studying archival snippets, one tends to reify was fifty-four years old, and they were only occasion them and to grant them more status than is probably ally together during the remaining twenty-one years warranted. Early in my research, when I found a letter of their friendship. that confirmed some hypothesis or inclination of my Moreover, when we witness events at first hand own, I would exaggerate its authority and view it as we tend to regard our perceptions as the correct ones, if it were a straightforward, unambiguous index. At believing as we do in the primacy of our own senses, such times I equated the papers with their creators, even though the shortcomings of eyewitness accounts and things proceeded smoothly. But I soon became are well known to journalists and courtroom attor equally interested in the formative experiences that neys alike. Although scholars rightly privilege first were not expressed. How to know the people, events, hand accounts (I have no doubt that Beaumont New feelings, and ideas that were not included in the docu hall could shed invaluable light on the documents ments? How to move behind, between, and beyond discussed in the fourth and fifthsections of this essay), the simple words jotted on a scrap of paper thirty or such accounts bring with them their own inherent forty years ago? How to bridge the personal, tem limits. Proximity in itself assures neither insight nor poral, and historical disjunctions? I could not account truth. for all the days and weeks during which letters weren't Churchill, for example, wrote in his memoirs that written, or for all of the letters that were discarded or relations with Roosevelt were consistently warm and lost, or for the realities that never found their way marked with commonality of purpose. But the pub into conscious thought or language. lication of recently declassified Churchill-RooseveltNew When reconstructing the relationship between Ad lettersYork Times, suggests that there was considerable disagree ams and White, for example, I relied largely upon ment between them. In a recent article in the letters. But when both men were together there was Warren F. Kimball, the editor of the cor no need for letters: over coffee or wine they could respondence,60 said that, "Stripped of its romanticized indulge in the meandering conversations that mark myth, the relationship was made of mutual self-inter any face-to-facefriendship. Such moments have more est. " Did Churchill simply gloss over the bitter mo bearing on the heart of a friendship than any packet of ments when writing his memoirs? Were there political letters, however skillful the writers. But, of course, or personal reasons for downplaying their differences, there are no records of these conversations. For all we even after so many years had elapsed? Are the letters, know, during 1952 White might have begun all of his published several decades after they were written, one-on-one encounters with Adams by intoning a misleading? Does the tone suggest discord thatNew in Yorkfact "GRRRRRRRRRR," while Adams responded with a was something different? And are we to trust Profes sustained "MEEEEOOOOWWW." Both men are sor Kimball's assessment? Or that of the 41 Times? After all, professors and newspapers have much who left no written records of their lives. This is one to gain in discovering new angles on old stories. In of many reasons why most history has been of the such cases, how do we decide which version to privi landed and monied classes. French historians like Phil lege in order to discover the truth(s) of the matter? lippe Aries, Roy LaDurie, and Fernand Braudel have There is the additional problem of the researcher pioneered more broadly based social histories by in not having access to all of the relevant materials, as troducing nontraditional source materials and meth we saw earlier in the case of Patricia Bosworth's biog ods into their research. For example, Brandeis history raphy of Diane Arbus. There may exist very revealingAper professor John Demos unraveled elements of every fl,1re's papers in White's archives at Princeton and in day life in the Plymouth Colony by studying public61 files, but few researchers and historians have records, artifacts, and "material culture" from which had access to them. Accordingly, I was forced to rely he inferred the texture and tenor of the times. The heavily on the Adams-Newhall correspondence, pub further back in history we go, the more these prob lished versions of these issues, and my own recollec lems are compounded. Anthropologists reconstruct tions of Minor White (which occurred many years entire neolithic cultures from a handful of potsherds, after the events under discussion here). Mathematics while paleoanthropologists, studying the precursors is not the only domain that has its incompleteness of man with a sack of bones, consider themselves theorems; scholarly research, especially when it con fortunate in their riches. cerns controversial people and issues, is always under The problems rehearsed above are clearly not con rev1s1on. fined to photographic scholarship, but extend into all Clearly, there are no foolproof or formulaic solu forms of scholarship and, more broadly, all forms of tions to problems like these, _for the difficulties in knowing. Scholars first divide the world into the rel knowing an archive are tantamount to the difficulties evant and the irrelevant, and proceed to find, in Greg in knowing any person or event. Confronted with ory Bateson's phrase, "patterns that connect" from the contradictions of a Churchill or an Adams, the which "meaning" is generated.62 Jacob Bronowski has scholar seeks out as many sources as possible, corre stated the case with admirable conciseness: lates and weighs the various accounts, and sees what if anything emerges. Conundrums are, on occasion, I believe that every event in the world is con resolved. But more often, the contradictions and in nected to every other event. But you cannot consistencies of statesmen, photographers, and every carry on science on the supposition that you are one else are no more solvable in scholarly retrospect going to be able to connect every event with than they were to those who lived with and through every other event .... We make a cut. We put them. In a field as young and uncharted as photog the experiment, if you like, into a box. Now raphy, everything is subject to revision. No history the moment we do that, we do violence to the is ever finished, much less "definitive." When done connections in the world .... I am certainly not right, research stirs up as much as it settles. going to get the world right, because the basic For all of their inherent limitations, the materials I assumption that I have made about dividing the studied at the Center for Creative Photography were world into the relevant and the irrelevant is in much more complete than what most scholars have at fact a lie. In the nature of things it is bound to their disposal.This is the case in part because the Cen give me only an approximation to what goes ter, when possible, collects a photographer's entire inside the fence .... Therefore, when we prac archives, including negatives, prints, personal and tice science (and this is true of all our experi professional papers, a practice that has obvious value ence), we are always decoding a part of nature 63 for in-depth study. which is not complete. We simply cannot get However, social historians of virtually any period out of our own finiteness. before 1850 would read my analysis of archival incom pleteness with wry amusement, since their materials Researchers overlook considerably more than they are much more restricted than mine. Among other attend to, much as the photographer frames a finite things, before 1850 literacy was largely limited to the slice from an infinite set of possibilities. Once [ had upper classes, which creates formidable problems for discovered patterns in the archival materials, they the historian wishing to understand those multitudes functioned as grids through which other materials 42 were read and assessed. The more a particular thesis or interest took hold, the more it determined what I found interesting and what I found irrelevant. At times the selections were consciously made; but much more often unconscious criteria and assumptions were operative, as is usually the case in human cognition. The patterns that connected Adams, White, Bullock, the Newhalls, and many other photographers whom I have not even mentioned here, were larger than any conceivable net I could throw over them, and the ideo logical contexts that shaped them and their discourse were all the more elusive. Earlier, I devoted many pages to a handful of documents, and yet the analysis could easily have run several times longer. As it is, I ..... '"' ... "-"••L-· emerged with a fairly schematic account that would :i." ·-"' 1.iror.\:,-u• ..._,.� • •.u.1.r..._ -•.:>U-eio�ror�-l,r-..- ...... u..:.-'"lt;r !.- :_ _, -·-l 43 The Makers or contraptions. After slaying the Minotaur, Theseus 'Inday, Mirror Stephen Fox cites a study which claims that the average American family is exposed to 1600 advertisements a got away because his lover, Ariadne, supplied him most of whichll/11mi11afio11s presumably include photographs. with a magic ball of yarn. But soon after, Ariadne 'Walter Benjamin, "The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical entered her own emotional labyrinth, for Theseus re Reproduction," (New York: Schocken, 1969), pp. paid her kindness by replacing her with her younger 240-241. sister, Phaedra. Daedalus, who was the architect of 'Through a reciprocal agreement between Yale's Beinecke Library, which houses most of the Stieglitz papers, and the Center for the labyrinth, had told its secret to Ariadne, who in Creative Photography, which houses the Paul Strand Archives, turn had passed it along to Theseus. When Minos copies of Strand's letters to Stieglitz are available at Yale, and heard of Daedalus's betrayal, he imprisoned Daedalus copies of Steiglitz's letters are at the Center. This allows a re in the labyrinth. Tr apped in his own trap, Daedalus searcher to read both sides of the correspondence at one sitting. fashioned wax wings that allowed him and his son Unfortunately, such reciprocal agreements between archives are Icarus to escape. 5still more the exception than the mle. 'Stieglitz to Adams, 17 January 1937, AAA. As Daedalus may have recognized, a bird's-eye Cf. Beaumont Newhall to Ansel Adams, 7 January 1937, AAA. view is essential for perspective and escape alike. But Adams responded positively to Newhall's request on January 12, even when airborne, such perspective is hard to several days before he would have received Stieglitz's advice. In achieve, and even if achieved, it is not without risks. his letter to Newhall, Adams mentioned an album of Timothy Icarus escaped death in the Cretan labyrinth, but he O'Sullivan's photographs that he had recently acquired and rec ommended that its contents be included in the exhibition, thereby plummeted to earth when he flewtoo close to the sun beginning O'Sullivan's rise in current photographic historiography. and his wax wings melted. The Cretan myth-makers ''IncludingHistory the of formation Phorography; of the Museum of Modern Art photog knew that ultimate, maze-penetrating vision lay be raphy department;Time the i11 writingNew England, and revisions of BeaumontThe Daybooks New of yond human faculties. hall'sEdward Weston, TheNancy Eloquellt Newhall's Light; collaborations with One labyrinth leads into another. I left Tucson in Paul Strand on Weston on Adams on the Photo League; an airplane, returningto Michigan's wintry gray skies. Aperture. 7 the formationPhoto Notes, of the George Eastman House;Photo the Notes, beginnings December of Nothing melted, but no one escaped either, for the 1934-Spri11g 1950 labyrinth had entered my mind. This essay is its initial Cf. January 1948; reprinted in aftermath. It has turned back upon itself, a fittingcon (Rochester: Visual Studies Reprint Book,New 1977), York clusion to a prolegomenon on photographic theory. n.p.Times, ""Girl Aide of FBI Testifies of 7 Years as 'Communist,'" 27 April 1949, p. 1. • Morgan's resignation letter to the Photo League was undated, but its approximateNew York date Times is 19 Book August Review, 1949. "'"James Baldwin-Reflections of a Maverick," interview by Julius 11 Arb11s Lester, 27 May 1984, p. 23. ACKNOWLEDGMENTS Patricia Bosworth, Dia11e (New York: Knopf, 1984), p. xi. The estate also denied permission to reproduce any of Arbus's I would like to thank Susan Cohen and Jan Zita Grover photographs. for their careful readings of this essay; and Jan Swear "StieglitzCamera to Strand,Work, 25 October 1919, photocopy in Paul CameraStrand Archive,Work: A CriticalCenter A11thology,for Creative Photography. ingen, who as always was my first and last editor. "Cf. 1914-1915, Number 47; reprinted in This essay was supported in part by a grant from the ed. Jonathan Green (MilJerton: Aper National Endowment for the Arts. ture, 1973), pp. 283 ff. In the introduction to the issue Stieglitz strikes a tone similar to that in his letter to Strand . . . . it suddenly struck me to ask myself, "What is '291 '?" NOTES Do I know? No one thus far had told the world. No one thus far had suggested its real meaning in CAMERA AAA Ansel Adams Archive, Center for Creative Photography WORK, and so again it flashed upon me to ask myself, WBA Wynn Bullock Archive, Center for Creative Photography "What is '291 '?" I would like to know. How find out? Why notk11ow let thenot people I. tell me what it is to them. And in telling BNNP Beaumont and Nancy Newhall Papers, Center for Crea- me, perhaps they will tell each other. Some say 'tis I. J tive Photography it is What is it? PSA Paul Strand Archive Stieglitz asked several people for their views, requesting that MWC Minor White Collection they "eliminate, if possible, any reference to myself." The con- 44 tributors included Anne Brigman, Francis Bruguiere, Djuna 44 Adams to White, 3 February 1952, MWC. 5 Barnes, Marsden Hartley, Arthur Dove, Man Ray, Charles Caf ' James Baker Hall, "Biographical Essay," Aperture #80 (simulta fin, Francis Picabia, John Marin, and Edward Steichen. neously published as Minor White: Rites and Passages), p. 88. "Stieglitz to Strand, 4 August 1921, photocopy in Paul Strand 46 Adams to Nancy and Beaumont Newhall, 12 October 1952, Archive, Center for Creative Photography. BNNP. "Ibid. 47 Adams to Nancy Newhall, 1 July 1953, BNNP. "'Leon Edel, "The Figure Under the Carpet," in Telling Lives: the '"Nathan Lyons once wryly suggested that the history of mid Biographer's Art, edited by Marc Pachter (Washington: New Re century American photography could be deduced by carefully public Books, 1981), pp. 22-23. studying the phone bills of Adams, White, and the Newhalls 17 "Controversy and the Creative Concepts," Aperture 2:2 Quly between 1950 and 1960. 1953), p. 3. '"By Ansel Adams, Melton Ferris, Dorothea Lange, Ernest Louie, '"Ibid., pp. 4-5. Barbara Morgan, Beaumont and Nancy Newhall, Dody Warren, lbid., p. 6. and Minor White. 9 21lJbid.,' p. 7. 50Adams to Beaumont Newhall, 3 April 1945, BNNP. 21 Ibid., pp. 7-8. Nancy Newhall to Ansel Adams, 30 June 1952, AAA. 1 22Ibid.' pp. 6, 13. 5 Adams to Nancy Newhall, 2July 1952, BNNP. lbid., p. 13. 52 Cf. Apert11re 4:3 (1956). 2 3 23'Bullock to Nancy Newhall, 16 November 1953, WBA. 545 Later in the decade Adams and the Newhalls would level similar Adams to Bullock, 1 December 1953, AAA. criticism at the photographs of Robert Frank. 26 25 Beaumont Newhall to Wynn Bullock, 9 December 1953, WBA. 55 This credo is a crucial point in Wynn Bullock's philosophy as well, 27 Minor White to Ansel Adams, 5 December 1953, AAA. as can be seen in his letter to Nancy Newhall. Later in his career lbid. Bullock took pains to distinguish his ideas from Minor White's, 2 289Minor White to Wynn Bullock, 11 December 1953, WBA. insisting that his theoretical bases lay in the sciences rather than in ""Controversy and Creative Concepts," p. 3. Eastern mysticism. Nonetheless, Bullock was to subtitle his major 3 Beaumont Newhall to Wynn Bullock, 9 December 1953, WBA. monograph Photography: A Way of Life (1973), a trope that White 31 32 Unfortunately, the biography was never written, largely out of had used for many years. deference to Dorothy Norman, whose belated Alfred Stieglitz: An 56 Arnold Hauser, T/1e Sociology ofArt (Chicago: University of Chi American Seer appeared in 1973. cago Press, 1982), p. 93. Ansel Adams to Nancy Newhall, 17July 1946, BNNP. Newhall, "Controversy and Creative Concepts," p. 3. 33 587 1945-1960 34 Nancy Newhall to Ansel Adams, 25June 1948, AAA. 5 Marty Jezer, The Dark Ages: Life in the United States Nancy Newhall to Ansel Adams, 7 October 1945, AAA. (Boston: South End Press, 1982), p. 45. 356 lronically, Stieglitz himself was never much interested in the Justin Kaplan, "The 'Real Life,'" in Studies in Biography, ed. Daniel West, instead preferring Manhattan and, during the summers, his 59Aaron (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1978), p. 3. family house at Lake George, New York. He politely but reso 60"The Knotty Parts of WW II Ties," New York Times, 15 July 1984, lutely turned down numerous requests to visit the West from sec. E, p. 7. Strand, Adams, and others. Even after Georgia O'Keeffe began See John Demos, A Littls Commonwealth: Family Life in Plymouth spending her summers at Ghost Ranch, New Mexico, Stieglitz 61 Colony (New York: Oxford, 1970). never travelled beyond the borders of New York State. 62See especially Gregory Bateson, Mind and Nature (New York: 37 lbid., pp. 11-12. Dutton, 1979). :5eaumontNewhall to Ansel Adams, 17 October 1952, AAA. Jacob Bronowski, The Origins of Knowledge and Imagination (New 39 38 Nancy Newhall to Ansel Adams, 18 & 19 October 1952, AAA. 63 Haven: Yale University Press, 1978), pp. 58-59. '" Adams to Beaumont Newhall, 24 October 1952, AAA. 64 Allan Sekula, "Photography Between Labour and Capital," in 41 Nancy Newhall to Ansel Adams, 13 March 1946, AAA. Mining Photographs and Other Pictures, ed. Benjamin H. D. Buch Nancy Newhall to Ansel Adams, 13 April 1946, AAA. Joh and Robert Wilkie (Halifax: The Press of the College of Nova 42 White to Adams, 24January 1950, MWC. Scotia College of Art and Design, 1983), p. 197. 3 ' 45 Exhibitions 1982-1985 by NANCY SOLOMON EXHIBITIONS HAVE BEEN AN IMPORTANT PROGRAM OF April 25-June 3 the Center for Creative Photography since it opened Photo-Pictorialists of Buffalo in November 1975. A primary goal of the exhibition (organized by the Albright-Knox Art Gallery) program is to show work from the Center's own col Main Gallery lection, often revealing new material not previously accessible to the public. The Center is also committed Torn Millea to showing new photographs by contemporary art Contemporary Gallery ists, as well as taking traveling exhibitions organized by other institutions. A listing of the exhibitions shown between 1975 June 6-July 29 and 1981 appeared in The Archive, no. 15. Johan Hagemeyer Main Gallery New Acquisitio11S: Contemporary Photography ----1982---- Contemporary Gallery December 20, 1981-January 28, 1982 Dean Brown August 1-September 9 Margrethe Mather Main Gallery January 31-March 11 Harold Jones Moholy-Nagy Contemporary Gallery Main Gallery Will Larson Contemporary Gallery September 12-October 14 Jerry Uelsmann: A Retrospective, 1956-1981 March 14-April 22 Cubism and American Photography (organized by the October 17-December 1 Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute) Ansel Adams: An American Place, 1936 Main Gallery Main Gallery Linda Connor Ansel Adams Collection: 1925-1940 Contemporary Gallery Contemporary Gallery 46 December 5, 1982-January 13, 1983 August 28-October 6 Aaron Siskind: Fifty Years Marion Palfi (shown at the University of Arizona Museum of Art) Main Gallery Work by Former Students of Aaron Siskind Robert Fichter Main Gallery Contemporary Gallery Nancy Rexroth Con tern porary Gallery October 9-November 17 Aspects of Family: Photographs from the ---1983--- Permanent Collection Main Gallery January 16-February 24 Joe Deal: "The Fault Zone" Ralph Steiner: Works from the Collection Contemporary Gallery Main Gallery Judith Golden ---1984--- Contemporary Gallery November 20, 1983-January 12, 1984 February 23-March 20 Brett Weston: Photographs 1927-1983 Sewing Space: A Soft Photographic Environment Main Gallery by Catherine Jansen Graciela Iturbide (shown at the University of Arizona Museum of Art) Contemporary Gallery February 27-April 7 Stefan Moses January 15-March 1 Main Gallery Two New Archives: Mitchell Payne and Stephen Sprague Meridel Rubenstein Main Gallery Contemporary Gallery Joan Lyons Contemporary Gallery April 10-May 19 Instant Variations: Selected Artists/Polaroid Collection March 4-April 19 Main Gallery Edward Steichen: Portraits from the John Diva/a Joanna Steichen Bequest Contemporary Gallery Main Gallery May 22-July 14 Sandra Haber Contemporary Gallery Paul Anderson-William Mortensen Main Gallery April 22-June 14 Thomas Joshua Cooper Contemporary Gallery Edouard Boubat: "Hindsights" (organized by the French Cultural Services) July 17-August 25 Main Gallery Espejo Denny Moers (organized by the Oakland Museum) Contemporary Gallery Main Gallery Stephen Strom June 17-August 16 Contemporary Gallery Rodchenko, Bauhaus, Umbo 47 Edward Weston in Mexico Eleanor and Barbara: Photographs by Harry Callahan August 19-September 12 March 31-April 25 (organized by the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art) AprilBarbara 28-June Kasten 20 SeptemberJoyce 23-NovemberNeimanas 1 Laurie Klingensmith Man Ray: "Electricite" June 23-August 22 Main GaUery NewNorth Acquisitions Gallery Contemporary Gallery NovemberJay 4-November Mather 28 South Gallery Arizona Daily Star) Robert BuitronAugust and25-October Louis Carlos 10 Bernal (co-sponsored by the Main Gallery (co-sponsored by the Valley National Bank) NovemberCecile Abish: 4-December "Say When" 13 StephenOctober Shore: 13-November "The Montana 21 Suite" Contemporary Gallery EuropeanSouth Portfolios, Gallery I and II In December 1984 and early January 1985 the galleries were closed for construction of additional storage for North Gallery the Center's collections. The remaining exhibition space was divided into North and South Galleries. Marion Post Wolcott November 24, 1985-January 9, 1986 Arizona Daily Star) ----1985--- (co-sponsored by the Henri Cartier-Bresson:January 13-February Photographs 14 from Mexico Each year the Center organized exhibitions that were (organized by the Mexican Cultural Center, Paris) shown in the Galleria of the Arizona Bank in Phoenix: Lucas Samaras: Photos Polaroid Photographs January 13-February 10 DecemberHerbert Bayer: 14, 1982-January Photographic 14,Works 1983 1969-1983 (shown at the University of Arizona Museum of Art) Paul Caponigro: Photographs from the Polaroid Collection LewisFebruary Hine: Photographs 17-March from 29 the March 22-May 11, 1984 National Research Project, 1936-1937 Bradford Washburn (organized by the April 25-May 15, 1985 International Center of Photography) 48 Acquisitions: January-June 1984 Compiled by JUDITH LECKRONE THE FOLLOWING LIST IS AN ARTIST'S NAME INDEX TO PHOTO GILPIN, LAURA graphs acquired by the Center during the first half of 1984. untitled, n.d. (portrait of a Navajo silversmith) Full descriptions are given for groups of ten prints or less; Gelatin silver print, 23.5 x 16.8 cm titles and dates are given for groups of eleven to one hun Gift of Margret Craver dred prints; and groups over one hundred are summarized. 84:008:001 Dates are given as "negative date/printing date" when both Las Comadres, are known. An acquisitions list for 1975 to 1977, the Cen ITURBIDE, GRACIELA ter's first three years of operation, has been published in the 1979 Guide Series, Num her 4. CopiesThe Archive. of this guide may be pur Gelatin silver print, 17.4 x 25.6 cm chased for $3.50. Acquisitions for the intervening years can Purchase Lat, Paris, be found in past issues of 84:011:112 For Strength and Vision, CURTIS, EDWARD 1976 Gelatin silver print, 25.5 x 18.5 cm n.d. Purchase Revelacion, Coyoacan, Modern gravure from the original copper plate, 84:011:003 18.7 x 13.4 cm 1983 Gift of Mr. and Mrs. Steven Kern The North American 84:004:001 Gelatin silver print, 17.6 x 25.9 cm Indian, Purchase Two hundred and ten gravures from 84:011:002 1907-1930, each approximately 12.7 x 19.4 cm Chair, Gift of Bill and Ann Buckmaster JONES, HAROLD 84:024:001-210 1980 Ansel Adams, Painted gelatin silver print mounted on masonite, GASSER, PETER 1.2 X 1.5 m 1979-1984 Purchase Gelatin silver print, 32.5 x 24.6 cm 84:025:001 Gift of Peter Gasser Froze11 Mood 84:010:001 LOVING, DON HELEN GEE ARCHIVE GEE, HELEN Gelatin silver print, 23.1 x 17.5 cm Gift of Stuart Alexander Four linear feet of manuscript and archive materials 84:007:001 including business records; ledgers; mailing lists; correspondence; announcements, statements, press release, menus; newsclippings about the Limelight Gallery, ca. 1950-1957 Gift of Helen Gee AG 74 49 Black Rock Hill with Diago11al Lines, Death Valley, Co1111ersatio11s 111ith the Dead California, LYON, DANNYRFG 1976 (Portfolio) Ca11yo11 Point, Zion Canyo11 Natio11al Park, Utah, New York: Publishing Inc., I 983 83: 117:039 Seventy-six gelatin silver prints of varying sizes 1977 Cocon11t Palm Horizo11, Ko11a Coast, Hawaii, Purchase 83: 117:040 84:048:001-076 1978 Patio Fo1111tai11, Pavillion, New York, Great Salt Lake A11gles, Great Salt Lake, Utah, LY ONS.JOAN 83:117:042 1977 1982 Moo11rise over Pie Pa11, Capitol Reef Natio11al Park, 83:117:034 Vandyke print, 44.5 x 52.2 cm (irregular) Utah, Purchase 84:013:001 1977 Red Rock Repeat, Torrey, Utah, 83:117:038 MALONE, ROXANNE Kirlia11 Photo,<,?,ram, 1977 from the Geometric series Red Spri11g, Mo1111111e111 Valley, Uiah, 83: 117:036 1983 1977 Cibachrome print, 34. 9 x 27. 2 cm Tr ee and Mo1111tai11, Cleji, Bo11/der, Colorado, 83:117:035 Gift of Roxanne Malone Kirlia11 Photo,<,?,ra111, 84:022:002 Wa11e, Lace, Pescadero Beach, Cal[fomia, 1977 83:117:041 1983 ·1973 Cibachrome print, 34. 9 x 27. 1 cm W1111e Theory I, P1111a Coast, Hau1aii, 83:117:043 Gift of Roxanne Malone 1978 84:022:003 Wai,e Theory II, P1111a Coast, Hawaii, Kirlia11 Photogra111, 83:117:044 from the Platforms series 1978 1982 Wa11e Theory Pu11a Coast, Hawaii, 83:117:045 Cibachrome print, 34. 7 x 27.4 cm Ill, 1978 Gift of Roxanne Malone Wa11e Theory Puna Coast, Hawaii, 84:022:001 83:117:046 La Boda en Coyoaca,1, JV, 1978 MEYER, PEDRO Wa11e Theory P1111a Coast, Hawaii, 83:117:047 1983 V, 1978 Gelatin silver print, 20.5 x 30.4 cm 83:117:048 Purchase La Seiiora y s11s Sirvientes 84:012:001 SIMMONS-M YERS, ANN Chro111ebeard wi1h his Godda11ghter, fromthe Bikers series Gelatin silver print, 23.0 x 29.6 cm 1984 Purchase Gelatin silver print, 42.3 x 37.5 cm Los Zarapes de la Virge,, 84:012:002 Purchase 84:023:001 Espejo, Gelatin silver print, 20.5 x 30.5 cm SLAVIN, NEAL Purchase from 1978 (group exhibition) 84:012:003 Thirty-nine Polacolor prints, each approximately Altered Landscapes 19.0 x 24.0 cm PFAHL,JOHN RFG from the portfolio Gift of the Mexican American Legal Defense and Education Fund New York: Publishing, Inc., 1981 Antique hop Wi11dow Fifteen dye-transfer prints, each approximately 84:009:001-039 20 x 25 cm Baptism Gift from the collection of Arthur and Carol Goldberg 84:009:004 Big Dipper, Charlotte, North Caroli11a, 83:117 :034-048 1976 84:009:003 83:117:037 50 Boy at Scree,, Door Portrait with Portrait 84:009:011 84:009:021 Bride's Maids Portrait wi1/1 Sheets 84:009:002 84:009:036 Class Portraits Portrait wi1/1 Sheets 84:009:013 84:009:037 Cura11dera Railroad Car 84:009:014 84:009:010 Cura11dera ar Wi11dow Si,Rtl Painter 84:009:015 84:009:005 Double Christ Tee11agers 84:009:022 84:009:017 Family Roo111 To11111 l\1e11 84:009:025 84:009:006 Food Still Life T1110 Children 84:009:027 84:009:012 Girl Looking at Hcrse(f i11 Mirror untitled, [ railroad car man] 84:009:018 84:009:008 Girl 111ith Doll Window 84:009:019 84:009:038 Grocery Store Wo111a11 with Orange Curtain 84:009:007 84:009:033 Group Portrait Wo111a11 ,vith Orange Curtain 84:009:030 84:009:034 Group Portrait at Sunset Young J\1a11 with Guitar 84:009:016 84:009:026 Hair Curlers SMITH, KEITH 84:009:035 Book #81, 1981 House Artist's book of 32 images in various photographic 84:009:039 media Mai11 S1reet Purchase 84:009:001 84:021:001 Ma11 Looking i11to Sky STRANO, PAUL 84:009:023 One hundred gelatin silver and platinum prints of Man 111ith Shadow 011 Face varying sizes made by Richard Benson from the 84:009:009 original negatives Mayor's Portrait Purchase 84:009:031 84:028:001-100 Nuns Abstraction, Bails, Trvin Lakes, Co11nectiwt, 1915 84:009:029 84:028:026 Photos Abstraction, Porch Shado,vs, Twi11 Lakes, Co1111ectirnt, 1915 84:009:024 84:028:030 Pi11k Wall Abstraction, Porch Shado11,, Tr,,;,, Lakes, Co1111ectirnt, 1915 84:009:032 84:028:031 Portrait of Older Ma,, Akeley Camera 111ith Butterfly Net, New York, 1923 84:009:020 84:028:040 51 Apple Orchard i11 B/00111, Neu; England, Farmhouse, Winter, New England, 1946 1944 Beach Crass, Maine, Fem, Early Morning Dew, Georgetown, Mai11e, 84:028:060 84:028:070 1945 1927 Bell Rope, Massachusetts, Fem, New England, 84:028:098 84:028:014 1945 1928 Belle Cro111/ey, Ne111 E11<(!la11d, Figurehead, "Lady 111ith a Medallion," New England, 84:028:081 84:028:013 1946 1946 Bowsprit, Whale Ship, Myshe, Connecticut, Figurehead, Samuel Piper, New England, 84:028:049 84:028:086 1946 1946 Brow11sto11e Flats, Momi11gside Park, New York, Fishing Village, Gulf of St. Lawrence, Caspe, 84:028:084 84:028:087 1916 1929 B,mchberry, New Englaud, Forest, Maine, 84:028:010 84:028:044 1946 1928 Church Door, New Engla11d, Frame Houses, New York, 84:028:093 84:028:018 1946 1916 Com Crib and Snow, West River Valley, Vermont, Frank Jordan, Prospect Harbor, Maine, 84:028:080 84:028:007 1944 1946 Corn, Near Brattleboro, Vem,0111, From the Viaduct, 125th Street, Neu; York, 84:028:071 84:028:055 1946 1915 Cows Before Rain, New E11gland, From the Viaduct (Shadows), 1251/1 Street, New York, 84:028:088 84:028:006 1946 Dark Forest, Georgetown, Mai11e, 84:028:062 1915 Caston Lachaise, Maine, 1928 84:028:008 Dead Tree, Vermont, 84:028:019 1927 Ghost Town, Red River, New Mexico, 1945 84:028:005 "Death the Victor," Tombstone, Vermont, 84:028:092 1930 The Harbor, Evening, New England, 1946 84:028:047 The Dock, Ne111 England, 84:028:089 1946 Hay, Vermont, 1945 84:028:057 Downtown, New York, 84:028:058 1946 Henry Wass, Cape Split, Maine, 1915 84:028:075 Dried Seaweed, New Engla11d, 84:028:009 1946 House and Apple Blossoms, New England, 1946 84:028:051 Driftwood,Dark Roots, Mai11e, 84:028:099 1946 Houses, Locmariaquer, Finistere, Brittany, France, 1928 84:028:059 Driftwood, New E11gland, 84:028:024 1950 Iris, Georgetown, Maine, 1928 84:028:100 Driftwood, Maine, 84:028:023 1928 The Italian, New York, New York, 1928 84:028:012 Elwi11 Albee, Prospect Harbor, Maine, 84:028:022 1916 Jack in the Pulpit, New England, 1946 84:028:001 Empty House, New England, 84:028:054 1946 Jug and Fmit, Twin Lakes, Connecticut, 1945 84:028:094 Farmhouse, Window, New E11gland, 84:028:079 1915 Latch, Vermont, 1945 84:028:029 84:028:077 1944 84:028:076 52 Lathe, Akeley Shop, New York, 1923 Rock, Port Lome, Nova Scotia, 1920 84:028:032 84:028:021 Lathe, Akeley Shop, New Yotk, 1923 Sandwich Man, New York, 1916 84:028:033 84:028:004 Leo Wass, Cape Split, Maine, 1946 Seaweed, New E11gla11d, 1928 84:028:050 84:028:016 Lighthouse, New England, 1945 Slide Porch, Vermont, 1947 84:028:074 84:028:083 Little Dead Tree, New England, 1946 Spring Thaw, Massachusetts, 1946 84:028:095 84:028:061 Macl,ine #1, Akeley Shop, New York, 1922 Spnice and Lichen, Mai11e, 1945 84:028:034 84:028:097 Macl,ine, Akeley Sl,op, New York, 1922-23 Spnice and Rock, New England, 1946 84:028:036 84:028:096 Macl,ine, Akeley Shop, New York, 1923 Still Life, Pear and Bowls, Ttvin Lakes, Con11ectiwt, 1915 84:028:037 84:028:028 Macl,i11e, Akeley Shop, New York, 1923 Stone Mill, New England, 1946 84:028:038 84:028:068 Machine #2, Akeley Plant, New York, 1922 The Stone Wall, Stockberger's Fann, New England, 1944 84:028:035 84:028:065 Machine #2, Akeley Shop, New York, 1922 The Stove, Prospect Harbor, Maine, 1946 84:028:039 84:028:082 Man in Derby, New York, 1916 Storm and Sea, Maine, 1946 84:028:003 84:028:056 Meeting House Window, New Engla11d, 1945 Susan Tl,ompso11, Cape Split, Maine, 1945 84:028:078 84:028:048 Merill Spurling, Prospect Harbor, Mai11e, 1946 Telegraph Poles, Texas, 1915 84:028:053 84:028:041 Mill Dam, Vermont, 1945 Textile Mill, Ne1v England, 1946 84:028:067 84:028:069 Mullen, Maine, 1928 Toadstool and Grasses, Maine, 1920 84:028:025 84:028:015 Old Fisherman, Gaspe, 1936 Tombstone and Sky, New England, 1946 84:028:043 84:028:091 Old Man, Vermont, 1946 Trawlers, Maine, 1946 84:028:052 84:028:085 Orange and Bowls, Twin Lakes, Connectiwt, 1915 The Valley, New England, 1946 84:028:027 84:028:064 Portrait (Yawning Woman), Netv York, New York, Village, Gaspe, 1936 1915-1916 84:028:046 84:028:002 Village on a Salt Mars/,, Harrington, Maine, 1946 The River, Maine, 1946 84:028:066 84:028:063 Washington Heights, New York, 1915 Road, Wi11ter, New England, 1944 84:028:011 84:028:072 White Shed, Gaspe, 1929 Rock by the Sea, Georgetown, Mai11e, 1925 84:028:045 84:028:020 53 Winged Sk11/l, To111bs1011e, 'cm10111, Point Lobos, I 1945 WESTON, EDWARD Woma11 Carryi11.e Child, 84:028:090 1939 n.d. Gelatin silver prints, 19.2 x 24.4 cm The Woodpile, E11,{/la11d, 84:028:042 Gift of Esther Tuthill Compton l\'e111 1946 84:016:001 Wreck: Timber a11d S11ails, Ne111 E11,e,lc111d, 84:028:073 WHITE, MINOR 1928 untitled, n. d. [ rock formation] 84:028:017 Gelatin silver print, 7.2 x 11.4 cm Edward Weston Collection 84:017:001 54 Arizona Board of Regents Ex Officio BRUCE BABBITT Governor of Arizona CAROLYN WARNER State Superintendent of Public Instruction Appointed WILLIAM P. REILLY January 1988 TIO A. TACHIAS January 1988 A. J. PFISTER January 1990 DONALD G. SHROPSHIRE January 1990 EDITH SAYRE AUSLANDER January 1992 HERMAN CHANEN January 1992 ESTHER N. CAPIN January 1994 DONALD PITT January 1994 NORA ANN COLTON Student Liaison University of Arizona Administration HENRY KOFFLER, President; NILS HASSELMO, Senior Vice President for Academic Affairs and Provost; BEN J. TUCHI, Senior Vice President for Administration and Finance; LAUREL WILKENING, Vice President for Research and Dean of the Graduate College; DUDLEY B. WOODARD, Vice President for Student Affairs; GEORGE CUNNINGHAM, Jr., Vice President for Administrative Services; ALLAN BEIGEL, Vice President for University Relations and Development. Center for Creative Photography JAMES ENYEART, Director; MARGUERITE McGILLIVRAY, Administrative Assistant; TERENCE PITTS, Photographic Archives Curator and Librarian; AMY STARK, Photo graphic Archives Librarian; NANCY SOLOMON, Publications Coordinator; DIANNE NILSEN, Photographer; STEPHEN EISWEIRTH, Photographer; LAWRENCE FONG, Reg istrar; ANGELA V. GOMEZ, Secretary; ROGER MYERS, Archivist; SHARON ALEXAN DRA, Assistant Archivist; VICTOR LaVIOLA, Museum Assistant; KRISTEN MAULTSBY, Archives Clerk; CINDY REES, Archives Clerk; ROXANNE FRITH, Polaroid Fellow; J. MILLER ADAM, Student Assistant; JENNIFER BEIGEL, Student Assistant; SARAH CREACHBAUM, Student Assistant; RENEE HAIP, Student Assistant; JILL ORTENBERG, Student Assistant; DOREEN PIANO, Student Assistant; PAUL ROTH, Student Assistant; LAURA SALMON, Student Assistant; DANA WEINTRAUB, Student Assistant. �I .{?w)�� g-3 ' W, ___ ./ WM/ � -:, ---- � Envelope handwritten in ink from Alfred Stieglitz to Paul Strand, 4 August 1921; Paul Strand Archive. The ten-page letter is reproduced in "Labyrinths," pages 16, 19-21.