Bowdoin College Museum of Art | - Alfred Steiglitz; Published in "Camera Work", no. 46 (April 1914; issued October)

Preview image of work. photogravure, after charcoal drawing, Alfred Steiglitz; Published in "Camera Work", no. 46 (April 1914; issued October) 27414

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Alfred Steiglitz; Published in "Camera Work", no. 46 (April 1914; issued October)

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Artists

Marius de Zayas (Veracruz, Mexico, 3/13/1880 - 1/10/1961, Stamford, Connecticut); Alfred Stieglitz (Hoboken, New Jersey, 1/1/1864 - 7/13/1946, New York City, New York)

Title

Alfred Steiglitz; Published in "Camera Work", no. 46 (April 1914; issued October)

Creation Date

1914

Century

early 20th century

Dimensions

12 x 8 1/2 in. (30 x 22 cm)

Object Type

Creation Place

North America, United States

Medium and Support

photogravure, after charcoal drawing

Credit Line

National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D.C., NPG.88.4.E, Photo Credit: National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian Institution / Art Resource, New York

Copyright

This artwork may be under copyright. For further information, please consult the Museum’s Copyright Terms and Conditions.

This photogravure evidences Marius de Zayas’s chance encounter with an intriguing Polynesian object at The British Museum: a “soul-catcher”. Comprised of a series of six pairs of loops crafted from coconut twine, the portable sculpture seemed to the artist to encapsulate Alfred Stieglitz’s almost uncanny ability to build community. Undeniably, Stieglitz used his publication "Camera Work" to foster modernist camaraderie and to encourage conceptual innovations through his concrete demonstrations in print. For example, the April 1914 issue of the periodical, displayed here, contained six reproductions of de Zayas’s “absolute” caricatures originally in charcoal (for example, "Agnes Meyer", hanging nearby). Caricature generally does not require modeling from life. Thus, de Zayas, like Gertrude Stein, helped to widen the rift that had been steadily growing between portrait subject and physiognomic likeness since the "fin de siècle".