The Cleveland Museum of Art

Collection Online as of December 20, 2025

Subway Portrait

1938–41

Walker Evans

(American, 1903–1975)
America
Vintage gelatin silver print
Image: 12.3 x 18.2 cm (4 13/16 x 7 3/16 in.); Matted: 35.6 x 45.7 cm (14 x 18 in.)
Gift in memory of Laura Burgess 1987.152
© Walker Evans Archive, The Metropolitan Museum of Art
Location: Not on view

Description

For four years, Walker Evans secretly photographed passengers on New York City subways with a camera hidden in his jacket. Since he could not look through the viewfinder and the subjects did not know they were being photographed, these images are neutral portraits without preening or prejudice, experiments in chance and intuition. “The guard is down and the mask is off. . . . People’s faces are in naked repose down in the subway,” Evans wrote. “You don’t see among them the face of a judge or a senator or a bank president. What you do see is at once sobering, startling, and obvious: these are the ladies and gentlemen of the jury.”
  • Turner, Evan H. "The Year in Review for 1987." The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 75, no. 2 (1988): 30-71. p. 66, no. 56 25160017
    Cleveland Museum of Art, Tom E Hinson. Catalogue of Photography. Cleveland, OH: Cleveland Museum of Art, 1996. Reproduced: P. 150
  • A New York Minute: Street Photography, 1920–1950. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (July 11-November 7, 2021).
    From Riches to Rags: American Photography in the Depression. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (August 13-December 31, 2017).
    Icons of American Photography: A Century of Photographs from the Cleveland Museum of Art. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (June 24-September 16, 2007); Frick Art and Historical Center, Pittsburgh, PA (October 3, 2009-January 3, 2010).
    The Year in Review for 1987. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (February 24-April 17, 1988).
  • {{cite web|title=Subway Portrait|url=false|author=Walker Evans|year=1938–41|access-date=20 December 2025|publisher=Cleveland Museum of Art}}

Source URL:

https://www.clevelandart.org/art/1987.152