Modernism became a genre of photography in the early 1900s, when photographers desired to distinguish themselves from their pictorial counterparts in both medium and intended audience effect. This paper will examine a photograph of a well-known modernist photographer, Alfred Stieglitz, and discuss the elements of the composition that make it part of the modernism era.
Photographers adhering to the modernist ideals of the early twentieth century believed that photography should distinguish itself from the medium of painting because paintings were not as true to real life as photographs could be. Therefore, modernist photographers did not produce works of art that resembled paintings with large, abstract brushstrokes; their photos were creatively produced to portray real life as it looks through the audiences’ eyes.
Alfred Stieglitz was a well-known photographer of the modernist era and attached is his1910 photograph titled “The Pool – Deal, which can be considered one of the first modernist photographs produced by Stieglitz has he began to drift away from the older pictorial styles.
This photo is modernist due to its raw composition that depicts real life without the alteration of existing components of a composition to create desired visual effects. In the case of the previous genre of pictorialism photography, Stieglitz would use natural elements such as fog, smoke and rain to create an almost glowing, surreal effect in photos. This is not the case in this modernist photograph. The lines are clear cut with strong angles in the wood beams, the exposure has been brought up to brighten the shadows and the subjects in the foreground are clearly in focus while the background is out of focus. These are all traits of modernist photography.
It is as if photographers of the early twentieth century realized they were working with a machine, their cameras, instead of a manual paintbrush and began to produce works of art that embodied this new technology. The photograph above is very natural as it mimics the way the audiences’ eyes would see the image, therefore adhering to the modernist principles of photography.
Stieglitz embodied the new modernist practices in “The Pool – Deal” as one can see the full spectrum of black and white in the contrast, which is an effect that was clearly done with a camera and not a paintbrush. The photography worked to emphasize “more geometric motifs, effects of sharp focus, and high contrast, it celebrates a more mechanized phase of modern life in America” (Alfred Stieglitz Biography, Art, and Analysis of Works). This mechanized phase is evident in the inclusion of the structure in the foreground and the implied notion that the structure is man-made, and therefore mechanical, as opposed to a natural element Stieglitz had previously worked with in his compositions.
Another hint of modernism is the fact that the objects in front of the camera were not staged in a way that would romanticize the piece; Stieglitz was capturing real life as it happened while still including angles and lines that would not have been able to be produced by a paintbrush.
In conclusion, Alfred Stieglitz’s 1910 photograph “The Pool – Deal” is modernist due to its increased exposure, sharp focus, high contrast and refusal to romanticize the subjects. The piece lets the audience view the subjects as if they were there on the day of the photography shoot, thus enhancing the realistic and natural effect of the entire composition.
Works Cited
“Alfred Stieglitz Biography, Art, and Analysis of Works.” The Art Story. Web. 20 June 2015. http://www.theartstory.org/artist-stieglitz-alred.htm.
Stieglitz, Alfred. The Pool - Deal. 1910. Museum of Modern Art, New York. The Collection. Web. 19 June 2015. <http://www.moma.org/collection/object.php?object_id=51862>.
