NATHAN LERNER, 1913-1999 Eye and barbed wire, 1939

NATHAN LERNER, 1913-1999
Eye and barbed wire, 1939

Gelatin silver print. 15 7/8 x 19 ¼ in. (40.3 x 48.9 cm). Signed in ink on the reverse of the flush-mount.

PROVENANCE Adam Boxer, New York

LITERATURE Corbeau & Renard, La trajectoire du regard, p. 51

Having studied under László Moholy-Nagy at the New Bauhaus in Chicago in 1937, Nathan Lerner played a pivotal role in the establishment of modern abstract photography in America in the mid 20th century. Strongly influenced by his teacher's constructivist approach to photography, Lerner experimented with 'light boxes,' constructions he built to catch and reflect light cast on everyday objects which resulted in photographs that show the American take on the photograms and rayograms earlier championed by Moholy-Nagy and Man Ray. In addition to this body of work, his series of images of eyes eerily placed in the landscapes represent his further liberation of photography from representation and are said to speak to the contradictions between what it is to see versus what it is to look. Later in life, Lerner succeeded Moholy-Nagy as the Head of Photography at the School of Design, the second incarnation of the New Bauhaus.