Edward Steichen

Edward Steichen
Edward Steichen, photographed by Fred Holland Day (1901)
Born	Éduard Jean Steichen (1879-03-27)March 27, 1879 Bivange/Béiweng, Luxembourg
Died	March 25, 1973(1973-03-25) (aged 93) West Redding, Connecticut, U.S.
Nationality	Luxembourgish by birth; American from 1900
Known for	Painting, Photography
Spouse(s)	Clara Smith ​ ​ (m. 1903; div. 1922)​ Dana Desboro Glover ​ ​ (m. 1923; died 1957)​ Joanna Taub ​ ​ (m. 1960;  1973)​

Edward Jean Steichen (March 27, 1879 – March 25, 1973) was a Luxembourgish American photographer, painter, and art gallery and museum curator.

Steichen was the most frequently shown photographer in Alfred Stieglitz's groundbreaking magazine Camera Work during its run from 1903 to 1917. Together Stieglitz and Steichen opened the Little Galleries of the Photo-Secession, which eventually became known as 291 after its address.

His photos of gowns for the magazine Art et Décoration in 1911 are regarded as the first modern fashion photographs ever published. From 1923 to 1938, Steichen was a photographer for the Condé Nast magazines Vogue and Vanity Fair while also working for many advertising agencies including J. Walter Thompson. During these years, Steichen was regarded as the best known and highest paid photographer in the world. In 1944, he directed the war documentary The Fighting Lady, which won the 1945 Academy Award for Best Documentary.

From 1947 to 1961, Steichen served as Director of the Department of Photography at New York's Museum of Modern Art. While at MoMA, he curated and assembled the exhibit The Family of Man, which was seen by nine million people.

Early life

Steichen was born Éduard Jean Steichen in Bivange, Luxembourg, the son of Jean-Pierre and Marie Kemp Steichen. Jean-Pierre Steichen first immigrated to the United States in 1880. Marie Steichen brought the infant Éduard along once Jean-Pierre had settled in Chicago, in 1881. The family, with the addition of Éduard's younger sister Lilian, moved to Milwaukee in 1889, when Steichen was 10.

In 1894, at fifteen, Steichen began attending Pio Nono College, a Catholic boy's high school, where his artistic talents were first noticed; his drawings in particular were said to show promise. He quit high school to begin a four-year lithography apprenticeship with the American Fine Art Company of Milwaukee. After hours, he would sketch and draw, and began to teach himself to paint. Having come across a camera shop near his work, he visited frequently until he persuaded himself to buy his first camera, a secondhand Kodak box "detective" camera, in 1895. Steichen and his friends who were also interested in drawing and photography pooled together their funds, rented a small room in a Milwaukee office building, and began calling themselves the Milwaukee Art Students League. The group also hired Richard Lorenz and Robert Schade for occasional lectures.

Steichen was naturalized as a U.S. citizen in 1900 and signed the naturalization papers as Edward J. Steichen; however, he continued to use his birth name of Éduard until after the First World War.

Henri Matisse and La Serpentine, fall 1909, Issy-les-Moulineaux, photograph by Edward Steichen

Steichen married Clara Smith in 1903. They had two daughters, Katherine and Mary. In 1914, Clara accused her husband of having an affair with artist Marion H. Beckett, who was staying with them in France. The Steichens left France just ahead of invading German troops. In 1915, Clara Steichen returned to France with her daughter Kate, staying in their house in the Marne in spite of the war. Steichen returned to France with the Photography Division of the American Army Signal Corps in 1917, whereupon Clara returned to the United States. In 1919, Clara Steichen sued Marion Beckett for having an affair with her husband, but was unable to prove her claims. Clara and Eduard Steichen eventually divorced in 1922. Steichen married Dana Desboro Glover in 1923. She died of leukemia in 1957. In 1960, aged 80, Steichen married 27-year-old Joanna Taub and remained married to her until his death, two days before his 94th birthday. Joanna Steichen died on July 24, 2010, in Montauk, New York, aged 77.

Partnership with Stieglitz

Young American Artists of the Modern School, left to right Jo Davidson, Edward Steichen, Arthur B. Carles, John Marin; back: Marsden Hartley, Laurence Fellows, c. 1911, Bates College Museum of Art

Clarence H. White thought Steichen and Stieglitz should meet. White produced an introduction letter for Steichen and Steichen met Alfred Stieglitz in New York City in 1900; Steichen at the time en route to Paris from his home in Milwaukee. In that first meeting, Stieglitz expressed praise for Steichen's background in painting and bought three of Steichen's photographic prints.

In 1902, when Stieglitz was formulating what would become Camera Work, he asked Steichen to design the logo for the magazine with a custom typeface. Steichen was the most frequently shown photographer in the journal.

In 1904, Steichen began experimenting with color photography. He was one of the first people in the United States to use the Autochrome Lumière process. In 1905, Stieglitz and Steichen created the Little Galleries of the Photo-Secession, which eventually became known as 291 after its address. It presented some of the first American exhibitions of Henri Matisse, Auguste Rodin, Paul Cézanne, Pablo Picasso, and Constantin Brâncuși.

Pioneering fashion photography

In 1911, Steichen was "dared" by Lucien Vogel, the publisher of Jardin des Modes and La Gazette du Bon Ton, to promote fashion as a fine art by the use of photography. Steichen took photos of gowns designed by couturier Paul Poiret, which were published in the April 1911 issue of the magazine Art et Décoration. According to Jesse Alexander, this is "... now considered to be the first ever modern fashion photography shoot. That is, photographing the garments in such a way as to convey a sense of their physical quality as well as their formal appearance, as opposed to simply illustrating the object."

Serving in the US Army in World War I (and the US Navy in the Second World War), Steichen commanded significant units contributing to military photography. After World War I, during which he commanded the photographic division of the American Expeditionary Forces, he reverted to straight photography, gradually moving into fashion photography. Steichen's 1924 photograph of Gloria Swanson is considered an iconic image of both Swanson and the silent film era, while a 1928 photo of actress Greta Garbo is recognized as one of the definitive portraits of Garbo.

World War 2

During World War II, Steichen served as Director of the Naval Aviation Photographic Unit. His war documentary The Fighting Lady won the 1945 Academy Award for Best Documentary.

Museum of Modern Art

In the summer of 1929, Museum of Modern Art director Alfred H. Barr, Jr. included a department devoted to photography in plan presented to the Trustees though it was not put in place until 1940, when it became the first department of photography in a museum devoted to twentieth-century art and was headed by Beaumont Newhall. Co-incident with Newhall's resignation in 1947, Steichen served as the Director of Photography until 1962, assisted by Grace M. Mayer. Among other accomplishments, Steichen created The Family of Man, a world-touring Museum of Modern Art exhibition, seen by 9 million visitors and consisting of over 500 photos that depicted life, love and death in 68 countries. Steichen's brother-in-law, Carl Sandburg, wrote a prologue for the exhibition catalog.

As had been Steichen's wish, the exhibition was donated to the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg. It is now permanently housed in the City of Clervaux (Luxembourgish: Klierf) in northern Luxembourg.

The initial publication of Ansel Adams' image Moonrise, Hernandez, New Mexico was in U.S. Camera Annual 1943, after being selected by Steichen, who was serving as photo judge for the publication. This gave Moonrise an audience before its first formal exhibition at the Museum of Modern Art in 1944.

In 1962, Steichen hired John Szarkowski to be his successor at the Museum of Modern Art.

On December 6, 1963, Steichen was presented with the Presidential Medal of Freedom by U.S. President Lyndon B. Johnson.

In 1970, an evening show was presented in Arles during The Rencontres d'Arles festival: "Edward Steichen, photographe" by Martin Boschet.

A show of early color photographs by Steichen was held at the Mudam (Musée d'Art moderne) in Luxembourg City from July 14 to September 3, 2007.

Steichen bought a farm that he called Umpawaug in 1928, just outside West Redding, Connecticut. He lived there until his death on March 25, 1973, two days before his 94th birthday. After his death, Steichen's farm was made into a park, known as Topstone Park. As of 2018, Topstone Park was open seasonally.

The Pond–Moonlight

Steichen's The Pond—Moonlight, multiple gum bichromate print, 1904.

Further information: The Pond—Moonlight

In February 2006, a print of Steichen's early pictorialist photograph, The Pond—Moonlight (1904), sold for what was then the highest price ever paid for a photograph at auction, U.S. $2.9 million. (See List of most expensive photographs).

Steichen took the photograph in Mamaroneck, New York near the home of his friend, art critic Charles Caffin. It shows a wooded area and pond, with moonlight appearing between the trees and reflecting on the pond. While the print appears to be a color photograph, the first true color photographic process, the autochrome process, was not available until 1907. Steichen created the impression of color by manually applying layers of light-sensitive gums to the paper. Only three prints of the Pond—Moonlight are still known to exist and, as a result of the hand-layering of the gums, each is unique. (The two prints not auctioned are held in museum collections.) The extraordinary sale price of the print is in part attributable to its one-of-a-kind character and to its rarity.

Gallery

• 
  Landscape with Avenue of Trees, a painting by Steichen, 1902
• 
  Portrait of Auguste Rodin by Steichen, 1902
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  The cover of Camera Work, showing Steichen's design and custom typeface. Also, in this specific issue, Issue 2, the entire volume was devoted to Steichen's photographs.
• 
  Self-portrait, by Edward Steichen. Published in Camera Work No 2, 1903
• 
  Portrait of J.P. Morgan, taken in 1903
• 
  The Flatiron Building in a photograph of 1904, taken by Steichen.
• 
  Experiment in Three-Color Photography, by Steichen, published in Camera Work No 15, 1906
• 
  Pastoral – Moonlight, by Steichen, published in Camera Work No 20, 1907
• 
  Eugene, Stieglitz, Kühn and Steichen Admiring the Work of Eugene, by Frank Eugene from 1907. From left to right are Eugene, Alfred Stieglitz, Heinrich Kühn, and Steichen.
• 
  Picture by Steichen of Brâncuși's studio, 1920
• 
  Portrait of Constantin Brâncuși, taken at Steichen's home & studio at Voulangis, in 1922.
• 
  Wind Fire. Thérèse Duncan, the adopted daughter of Isadora Duncan, dancing at the Acropolis of Athens, 1921, by Steichen.
• 
  Isadora Duncan in the Parthenon, Athens, 1921
• 
  "Aircraft of Carrier Air Group 16 return to the USS Lexington (CV-16) during the Gilberts operation, November 1943." Photographed by Commander Edward Steichen, USNR.
• 
  CDR Edward Steichen photographed above the deck of the aircraft carrier USS Lexington (CV-16) by Ens Victor Jorgensen, November 1943.

References

• Haskell, Barbara (2000). Edward Steichen. New York: Whitney Museum of American Art.
• DePietro, Anne Cohen; Goley, Mary Anne (2003). Eduard Steichen: Four Paintings in Context. Hollis Taggart Galleries.
• DePietro, Anne Cohen (1985). The Paintings of Eduard Steichen. Huntington, NY: The Heckscher Museum. LCCN 85-80519 (Exhibition Catalog).
• Mitchell, Emily (2007). The Last Summer of the World. Norton. (A fictional narrative about Steichen.)
• Niven, Penelope (1997). Steichen: A Biography. New York: Clarkson Potter. ISBN 0-517-59373-4.
• Sandeen, Eric J. (1995). Picturing an Exhibition: The Family of Man and 1950's America. University of New Mexico Press.
• Smith, Joel (1999). Edward Steichen: The Early Years. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.
• Steichen, Edward (1955). The Family of Man: The Greatest Photographic Exhibition of All Time. New York: Maco Pub. Co for the Museum of Modern Art.

External links

• Edward J. Steichen Online
• Edward Steichen Photographs
• bloom! Experiments in color photography by Edward Steichen at Mudam
• Edward Steichen at Museo Reina Sofia in Madrid, Spain from June 25, 2008, to September 22, 2008
• [1]—David Joseph (DJ) Marcou's cover-story Edward Steichen, HonFRPS: Renaissance Man in March 2004 RPS Journal, pp. 72–75.
• Triond link to David J. Marcou's article "From Luxembourg and America to the World: Edward Steichen's Photographic Legacy" relating to Mr. Steichen's Wisconsin background, in particular, can be found on La Crosse History Unbound Website.
• "A list of the 1963 recipients of the Medal of Freedom", John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum
• Edward Steichen Archive at The Museum of Modern Art