Beschreibung:

PROPERTY OF THE LARRY N. DEUTSCH COLLECTION, CHICAGO/TUCSON Alfred Stieglitz Equivalent 1926 Gelatin silver print. 3 5/8 x 4 5/8 in. (9.2 x 11.7 cm).
Provenance From Georgia O'Keeffe; to Doris Bry; to Laurence Miller Gallery, New York Catalogue Essay The only other known example of this image is in the National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C. Following his travels around Europe at the end of the 19th-century, and his subsequent befriending of a number of leading figures in the European photographic scene, Alfred Stieglitz returned to New York and quickly cemented his reputation as one of the pioneering forces in the promotion of photography in the United States. As a means of encouraging interest in photographic discourse, Stieglitz initiated the publications Camera Notes, which ran for four years starting in 1897, and later, Camera Work, which ran for 14 years, starting in 1903. Additionally, Stieglitz formed the organization Camera Club of New York, followed by the Photo-Secession, both of which provided a strong platform that encouraged the expansion of the photographic dialogue throughout the first decades of the 20th century. Over the course of that period, Stieglitz advocated the constant engagement with the fine arts, especially European Modernism as championed by Henri Matisse and Paul Cézanne a gesture that ultimately resulted in his relinquishing of his former Pictorialist style and his embracing of a more Formalist aesthetic. Throughout the 1920s, Stieglitz came to reconcile the subjectivity of Pictorialism with the objectivity of photography and created the series of clouds known as Equivalents, as exemplified by the present lot. Of the series, Stieglitz has noted, “I have a vision of life, and I try to find equivalents for it.” His images, as such, were both representational and abstract, simultaneously relishing in a dual reading that was premised on co-existence. Reflecting the spectrum of emotions—from dramatic and overwrought to simple and subdued—the images of the clouds varied greatly. Moreover, many are devoid of any references to location, period, a meteorological event or even a horizon line that would indicate a correct reading of the image’s orientation, all of which condone viewers to read the photographs as abstractions disconnected from their traditional associations (especially in relation to landscape) but without losing their distinct nature as clouds. As such they are less natural celestial formations, as much as human-controlled abstractions, equivalent to “something already taking form within me,” as Stieglitz stated. Read More