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Untitled

1939
(American, 1895–1946)
America
gelatin silver print, photogram
Image: 50.6 x 40.3 cm (19 15/16 x 15 7/8 in.); Matted: 66 x 55.9 cm (26 x 22 in.)
Andrew R. and Martha Holden Jennings Fund 1992.10
© Estate of László Moholy-Nagy / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York
Location: not on view
Copyright
This artwork is known to be under copyright.

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Description

Sometimes the most literal photographs can be the most abstract. The influential painter, designer, photographer, filmmaker, theorist, and teacher László Moholy-Nagy was one of numerous émigré artists who arrived in the United States in the 1930s. In 1922 he began producing photograms, a process in which objects are placed directly onto light-sensitive paper and exposed to light. Here he has intuitively arranged wire, mesh, string, and thin plastic templates with geometric cut-outs to form an abstract, diagonal composition. Is it an inventory of works found in an artist’s studio or a mysterious dreamscape suggesting a world beyond time and place?
A black-and-white photogram depicting a collection of white grid-like patterns of shapes layered over each other on a black background. The photogram, made by placing objects onto a light-sensitive material and exposing it to light, creates a x-ray-like quality. Laid diagonally from the lower left to upper right corner are overlaid sheets with rows of square and circle cut-outs and mesh. A swirl of string winds behind the sheets, glowing white against the background.

Untitled

1939

László Moholy-Nagy

(American, 1895–1946)
America

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