Artwork Page for At the Telephone

Details / Information for At the Telephone

At the Telephone

1928

Alexander Rodchenko

(Russian, 1891–1956)
Culture
Russia
Medium
gelatin silver print
Measurements
Image: 13.8 x 8.9 cm (5 7/16 x 3 1/2 in.)
Credit Line
John L. Severance Fund 2007.146
Copyright
Art © Estate of Alexander Rodchenko/RAO, Moscow /VAGA, New York, NY
This artwork is known to be under copyright.
Location
Not on view
Print

Description

This photograph was part of a series commissioned to accompany a magazine article enumerating the steps in producing a newspaper. Rodchenko’s images emphasize women’s participation, such as this messenger phoning the editorial office with information for a story. "We must revolutionize our visual reasoning," Rodchenko urged photographers. "Photograph from all viewpoints except ‘from the belly button,’ until they all become acceptable. And the most interesting viewpoints today are those from above down, and from below up and their diagonals." Rodchenko was one of the most important figures in Russian Constructivism, a modernist movement that expressed revolutionary political content through new, equally radical visual approaches.
A vertically oriented hazy black-and-white photograph looks down from above at a person holding a wall-mounted telephone. The phone box dominates the upper half of the photograph. The person fills the photograph's lower left corner, leaning against the wall with their left arm and hold the phone to their ear with their right.

At the Telephone

1928

Alexander Rodchenko

(Russian, 1891–1956)
Russia

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