Edvards Steihens

Fotografija

Edward Steichen

Photography Edvards Steihens. Fotografija I Projekta vaditaJa I Project manager: Ginta Gerharde-Upemece Edward Steichen. Photography lzstades kuratore I Exhibition curator: Selda Pu~ite

lzstades d1zains I Exhibition design: Franceska Kirke Latvijas acionala makslas muzeja un Lu ksemburgas Nacionala vestures un makslas lzstade eksponet1e darbi I On d1splay at the exhibition works from: muzeja sadarblbas projekts I Luksemburgas Nac1onalais vestures un makslas muzeJS I Collaboration project between Latvian ational Luxembourg Nat1onal Museum of H1story and Art Mu eum of Art and Luxembourg ational

Museum of History and Art lzstade eksponetas dokumentalo fotografiju dig1talas kop11as 1

On display at the exhibition d1g1tal copies of documentary photographs from:

Latvijas prezidenturas Eiropas Savienlbas Edvarda Ste1hena arhivs, l\lujorkas Modernas makslas muze1s: Padome Kulturas programmas ietvaros I Scala. Florence Part of the Cultural Program of the Latvian Edward Ste1chen Arch1ve. the Museum of Modern Art, New York: Presidency of the European Union Council Scala. Florence

Latvijas 1 acionalais makslas muzejs I Halsmana arhivs. Magnum Photos I Latvian National Museum of Art Halsman Arch1ve. Magnum Photos

Izstazu zale ARSENALS I Luksemburgas pilsetas fototeka 1 The ARSENALS Exhibition Hall Phototheque de Ia Ville de Luxembourg 27.06.-06.09.2015.

UDK 77-051 (73) St 264

Edvards Steihens. Fotografija I lzmantotie atteli I Photographs by courtesy of: Edward Steichen. Photography © The Estate of Edward Steichen I Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York, 2015

Izstades katalogs / Exhibition catalogue © Halsman Archive, Magnum Photos, 2015 © Phototheque de Ia Ville de Luxembourg, 2015

Sastaditaja I Compiler: Selda Pu~ite

Tekstu autori I Texts: Malgorzata Nowara. Selda Pu~ite, Uz vaka I On the cover:

Alise Tlfentale Edvards Steihens. Pola Negri. 1925 (reprodukcija pee 1953). Fragments I

Dizains I Design: Anta Pence Edward Steichen. Pola Negri. 1925 (print after 1953). Detail

Latv1esu valodas redaktore I Latv1an language editor: Gilda Redliha

Tulkotaja no francu uz latviesu valodu I Translator from French into Latvian: © Selda Pu~ite , Malgorzata Nowara, Alise Tifentale, teksts, 2015

Kristine Ce!millere © Anta Pence, dizains, 2015

Tulkotaja ang!u valoda I Translator into English: Rita Laima Berzios © Latvijas Nacionalais makslas muzejs. 2015

TulkotaJS no ang!u valodas I Translator from English: ValdiS Abols © Luxembourg National Museum of History and Art, 2015

Tulkotajs no francu uz ang!u valodu I Translator from French into English: © Neputns, Riga, 2015

Frederic Demessine

Ang!u teksta redaktore I English language editor: lveta Boiko lzdevejs I Publisher:

Latvijas Nacionalais makslas muzejs I Latvian National Museum of Art

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Publicesanai sagatavots izdevnieciba "Neputns·· I

Produced for publication by "Neputns·· Publishing House ~-. Ncputns

www.neputns.lv

lespiests I Printed at "Jelgavas tipogr!ifija"

ISBN 978-9934- 512-57-5 The Artist and Propagandist: Steichen's Role at Two Decisive Moments in the History of American Photography

Alise Tlfentale Art historian

Edward Steichen's name is associated with the be viewed in this aspect. The aesthetics of emergence of two aesthetically and thematically Pictorialism was related to a creative protest different and even oppositely oriented against the democratization of photography in movements in photography. At the beginning the 188os, which included the industrial of the 20th century Steichen was a pioneer of manufacturing of photo paper, the fact that Pictorialism, and his 1904 photograph The Kodak began making and selling simple and Pond- Moonlight is a textbook example of relatively inexpensive cameras, photo optics this artistic style: intimate, romantic, timeless, were greatly improved, etc. Photography was and painterly. Yet in the mid-2oth century no longer an elite, refined, technically Steichen became a master of American political complicated pursuit like in the middle of the propaganda in photography and remains known 19th century. In fact, it quickly became a hobby for the creation of a radically new and different of the bourgeoisie that Kodak capitalized type of photography exhibit. In Steichen's on. Highbrow aesthetes scoffed at what they curated photography exhibits, Road to Victory viewed as the vulgarization of photography. (1942) and The Family ofMan (1955) at the A marvelous example of contrast between the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) in New York, two camps: take a look at the exhibit's sampling photographs lost their individuality, and the of Steichen's work from the beginning of the participating photographers' original intentions 20th century and compare it to the work of that were sacrificed for the sake of creating an era of his contemporary the dandy Jacques atmosphere of patriotic pathos. This article Henri Lartigue (1894- 1986) that exemplifies examines the two contradictory directions in the beginning of the new culture of carefree Steichen's career and their interpretations by art snapshots. historians in order to establish a broader On the backdrop of this new culture many context for the work on view in the exhibit. photographers, including Steichen, wished to preserve photography's status as an elite Steichen the Pictorialist artistic vocation; new associations sprang up A new trend in photography called Pictorialism throughout Europe and the United States. emerged in Europe and the United States at the Steichen is considered one of this trend's turn of the 20th century. New trends often pioneers in the US, and in 1902 together with identify themselves as a creative protest against photographer Alfred Stieglitz he began the a previous era's tradition, and Pictorialism can Photo-Secession movement; its name was

Edward Steichen Photography 33 a tribute to the so-called secessionists of element of nature or a demonic femme fatale. Vienna and Munich. Steichen and Stieglitz's In this case, the fatefulness is shown through Photo-Secession movement and other similar a sexualized female body; a shadow concealing associations in Europe ridiculed the usage of the woman's face renders it impersonal; the industrially manufactured photo materials; painterly composition seems to speak of instead, they accentuated each photograph's mournfulness or regret. An emotional mood uniqueness by using special handmade photo aimed at creating a dramatic or somber effect paper and developing particular printing is also typical of Pictorial ism and is intended to techniques (such as the bromoil and other oil differentiate between "serious" and "real" art, pigment-based processes, the gum bichromate and the vulgarity of the new snapshot culture. process, etc.). 1 The use of modern cameras was Another fundamental position of Pictorialism forbidden, with adherents returning to the was the avoidance of anything contemporary cameras of earlier times and making effects out and modern, and thus you will not find electric of defects. The ban pertained to lenses too; the poles, railroad tracks, or factory smokestacks pictorialists favored optics that created a slightly in pictorialist photographs. In Memoriam blurry image with soft contours, ignoring was intended to create the impression of technological advances that offered increasingly timelessness, and only the fact that this is a precise, detailed, and sharp images. The photograph reminds you that it is the product of photographers wanted to avoid the brutality, a modern, highly industrialized society. bluntness, and ordinariness of the image Pond- Moonlight (1904) is another work that towards which the technological approach to exemplifies Pictorial ism, although it is not photography seemed to be geared. Instead, included in the exhibit. An outstanding example they chose to use photographic techniques and of the use of the gum bichromate process, in means of expression like an artist would use a 2006 it sold for $2.9 million at New York's set of paints and paintbrushes - as instruments Sotheby's auction house, a record sum for a for producing subjective interpretations. 2 photograph. This landscape flooded with And this statement bas no better illustration moonlight evokes the melancholy nature of the than the well known (but unfortunately not art of Romanticism, in which there is no room included in this exhibit) photograph by Steichen, for the mundane or the contemporary. Self-Portrait with Brush and Palette (1902). This veering away from the contemporary and This superb example of Pictorial ism, a gum indulging in nostalgia for an idealized, bichromate print, indicates that the author imaginary past is one of the reasons why wished to position himself as an artist and a Pictorialism has been assessed critically since painter by using not only a painter's professional the second half of the 20th century. Another attributes but also photography's means of reason was that Pictorialism attempted to expression to pursue his painterly goals. replicate painting or the graphic arts, thereby Pictorialism's themes and iconography are meant disengaging itself from the theoretically existent to reveal subjective impressions and feelings, autonomy of its medium. Furthermore, the and a typical example of this in the exhibit is photographs produced by this movement are Steichen's work In Memoriam (1904). Here markedly apolitical -landscapes, symbolic we see a variation on a popular pictorialist nudes, or arresting portraits, as evident in the theme, the image of a woman borrowed from work of Steichen in this exhibit. Such subject Romanticism and Symbolism that can be matter has not helped this movement's interpreted as a mythological allegory for an theoretical reputation, at least according to the

Edward Steichen Photography 34 leading critics and theorists of photography Christopher Phillips was one of the first in the 1980s who are most often associated with, or to emphasize Steichen's radically innovative influenced by, October magazine and its approach to photography exhibits with his 1942 implied assumption that radical political and show Road to Victory at the MoMA. 4 The best social positions are expressed through radical known example of Steichen's curatorial work is aesthetics. From this perspective, Pictorialism the international exhibit The Family ofMan, is an insignificant surrogate style with no which opened at the MoMA in 1955 and toured political substance. It is to be noted, however, the world for the next decade in various forms, that the history of this type of art is being even showing up in 1959 in Moscow, the capital actively reviewed, and Pictorialism is being of the United State's ideological enemy, the reconsidered as the first truly international Soviet Union. Within the history of post-war movement in photography, a significant trend in photography, The Family ofMan is clearly the history of American photography, and even considered the most significant and influential as a "silent resistance".3 exhibit: anyone who has anything to say about photography bas criticized it, starting from Steichen the Curator Roland Bartbes.s The exhibit among other Steichen's other significant contribution to the history things was criticized for overly optimistic of American photography is his work as a humanistic pathos, claiming that all people are curator at the MoMA. This portion of his career the same, because they all are born, they suffer, paradoxically, contradictorily and yet logically love, and die, thereby silencing and concealing continues Steichen the photographer's career the very opposite, which is that all people are at the turn of the century. Logically, because a not the same, that racism exists, that there is department devoted to photography, established war, that economic inequality is pervasive, etc. within the art museum, was basically the The exhibit was also criticized for promoting dream of his youth come true. The paradox consumerism and what Guy Debord would and contradiction lies in the fact that Steichen call "the society of the spectacle", reducing the refuted Pictorialism's idea of photography as an world's diversity, pluralism, and complexity to individual, subjective work of art, and with a the passive consumption of visually pleasing surprising enthusiasm he greeted non-artistic images.6 photography, the kind that most of society It is important to note that The Family ofMan was engaged in. Another interesting turn is the cannot be imagined without the archive of Life fact that the beginning of Steichen's career at the magazine, from which many of the photographs MoMA is connected with wartime propaganda, were gleaned, nor can it be imagined which in its essence cannot have much in without Steichen's experience as a magazine common with the intimate, personal motifs of photographer. It is only logical that Steichen Pictorialism. This transformation is logical, applied many of the principles used in the however, because the romantic Steichen of pages of Life magazine to the exhibit, including 1902 in his self-portrait with paintbrushes and the combination of images of various sizes to a palette and the patriotic Steichen in the US achieve a maximum visual effect. These army uniform in 1942 are separated by four principles were effectively in direct contrast decades, two world wars, and radical changes in to the ideas of Pictorial ism; the photographs the use of photography in mass media, fashion that make up The Family ofMan serve only as and advertising, and political propaganda. visual material. They can be enlarged or made smaller depending on the intended effect, and

Edward Steichen Photography 35 they can be mounted on practically any flat debates as the epitome of the individual's surface in a room. These photographs are not freedom of expression.8 It did not matter how treated as works of art that would demand a apolitical Jackson Pollock was in his artistic more dignified attitude, such as being presented endeavors or how critical Robert Rausch enberg as framed original prints lined up in neat, was later on: in this context the aims of the symmetrical rows. In this exhibit an individual artists were only valuable insomuch as they author's intent is not particularly significant; could be adapted to the necessary political if the curator saw an image that he considered discourse. Steichen's exhibit ended up in a suitable, it was incorporated into the exhibit very similar situation, when the United States regardless of its original title, the photographer's government's propaganda apparatus wished to purpose in taking the photograph, and whether use it as their global messenger.9 Exhibiting The it was part of a larger thematic or narrative Family ofMan in Moscow was especially group of images. The vision of the curator was noteworthy in the context of the Cold War's what mattered, and, paradoxically, Steichen cultural policies; it was part of the first was an artist once more, "painting" with the American national exhibit in the USSR in 1959. works of other photographers by composing This exhibit happened to be the location of them according to his own ideas. Just like an the so-called Kitchen Debate between US Vice illustration of Rosalind Krauss' theory about President Richard Nixon and Soviet leader various discursive spaces, which determine a Nikita Khrushchev. The Soviet people's first photograph's content and meaning, the encounter with American culture and its photographs Steichen selected for the exhibit modern consumer goods has recently been acquired a completely new meaning because of analyzed from a historical perspective their size, placement, and sequence? It is showing that modern American art and The another question, however, whether this Family ofMan were among the show's central new meaning is somehow related to each attractions.10 It is important to note, however, photographer's original intent. From today's that Steichen's exhibit was not a 100% American perspective such a curator would be considered product, because the photographers be chose authoritarian, power hungry, and despotic, to include represented various countries around because today a curator's work ethic (at least the world, including the Soviet Union. theoretically) must involve a dialogue and These and other questions have been formulated in cooperation with artists. It is important to recent decades, when the history of exhibitions remember that this sort of understanding of emerged as a distinctive field of study within curatorial work had not emerged yet in the early the context of art history. Iftraditional art 1950s, when Steichen began working on The history was based on study of the biographies Family ofMan, and he saw his function and of artists and analysis of their work, then this duties as being similar to those of a magazine's new field of inquiry emphasized the exhibition picture editor. as a public announcement with its own meaning Another equally important aspect that largely and function, which is not necessarily the sum influenced the reputation of The Family ofMan of meanings of all the works in the exhibit. was its essential role in the ideological battle Exhibition in this context is viewed as an of the Cold War. For example, everyone knows independent entity, and its author is largely the that American Abstract Expressionism, a curator; through the curator's theoretical contemporary of The Family ofMan, was prism one can examine how art works acquire presented in the international arena of political a new meaning by being exhibited together at a

Edward Steichen Photography 36 specific time and place. The creation and Humanismus und Postmoderne: Eine Revision von Edward history of The Family ofMan have also been Steichens Fotoausstellung = Humanism and Postmodernism: recently viewed from this perspective.U It A Reappraisal of the Photo Exhibition by Edward Steichen. reminds us that there is no room for simplistic Marburg: Jonas Verlag, 2004. political contrasts in 20th century art history, 7 Krauss, R. "Photography's Discursive Spaces: Landscape/View". and Steichen's legacy serves as an example of Art Journal42.4 (1982), pp. 311-319. how an artist's career can make dizzying flips 8 See, for example, Guilbaut, S. How New York Stole the Idea of Modern between politically and aesthetically opposing Art: Abstract Expressionism, Freedom, and the Cold War. Chicago: platforms. University of Chicago Press, 1983. In the bromoil process, an image is transferred 9 See, for example, Turner, F. "The Family of Man and the Politics from a negative onto special photo paper, then of Attention in Cold War America". Public Culture 24.1 (2012), bleached until it becomes invisible, but its form pp. 55- 84; Bezner, L. C. Photography and Politics in America: is preserved in a gelatinous layer. The paper is From the New Deal into the Cold War. Baltimore: John Hopkins then treated with oil paints and brushes; in the University Press, 1999. areas exposed to light the gel has hardened 10 Reid, S. E. "Who Will Beat Whom? Soviet Popular Reception of the and become receptive to oil paint. The final American National Exhibition in Moscow, 1959". Critical review: image is reminiscent of a monochrome drawing Explorations in Russian and Eurasian History 9.4 (2008), or watercolor; its appearance is fluid and pp. 855- 904. diffused, with a gentle overlapping of tones; the 11 See, for example, Sandeen, E. J. Picturing an Exhibition: photographer can alter the image by erasing The Family of Man and 1950s America. Albuquerque: areas and unnecessary details. University of New Mexico Press, 1995; Ribalta, J., ed. Public

Photographic Spaces: Exhibitions of Propaganda, from Pressa

The bromoil process and other processes associated with Pictorialism to The Family of Man, 1928- 55. Barcelona: Museu d'Art

are described in Latvian, too, and were also used in Latvia. Contemporani de Barcelona, 2008.

See: Buclers, M. Fotografija. Rokas gramata pasmacibai visos

fotografiskos darbos. Riga: Valtera un Rapas akciju sabiedriba,

1924, pp. 310- 328.

2 Morand, S. Imagination and Pigment. Archaism and Technique

in Pictorialism. In: Impressionist Camera. Pictorial Photography

in Europe, 1888- 1918. London: Merrell, 2006, p. 254.

3 See, for example, Cutshaw S. M. and K. Sichel. California Dreamin':

Camera Clubs and the Pictorial Photography Tradition. Boston:

Boston University Art Gallery, 2004; Martin D. F. and N. Bromberg.

Shadows of a Fleeting World: Pictorial Photography and the Seattle

Camera Club. Seattle: University of Washington Press, 2011;

Ca116noaa, 0. Tnxoe conpoTHeneHne. PyccKaR nHKTOpnanbHaR

cfJororparfmR 1900-1930-X. MOCKBa: rYK r. MOCKBbl

"MynbT11MeA11HHbiH KOMnneKC aKTyanbHbiX 11CKYCCTB", 2008.

4 Phillips, C. "Steichen's Road to Vicotry". Exposure 18.2 (1980),

pp. 38-48.

5 Barthes, R. Mythologies. Translated into English by A. Lavers. New York:

Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 1972, pp. 100-102.

6 For a compilation of reviews about The Family of Man , see Back J.

and V. Schmidt-Linsenhoff. The Family of Man 1955- 2001:

Edward Steichen Photography 37