Untitled aerial view (World War I battlefield)

Artist Edward Steichen (American, born Luxembourg, 1879 - 1973)

Date1917-1918

MediumGelatin silver print

DimensionsImage: 9 3/4 × 14 inches (24.77 × 35.56 cm)
Sheet: 11 1/16 × 15 5/16 inches (28.1 × 38.89 cm)

Credit LineGift of Hallmark Cards, Inc.

Object number2005.27.2200

Signednone

Inscribednone

MarkingsOn image recto, lower right corner, in white: "12A"

On View

Not on view

Collections

Photography

Terms

DescriptionAerial landscape view of lightly populated area surrounded by open tracts of land. The earth is pockmarked with divets and small craters.Exhibition History

Exhibition History

Rotation 13. The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, MO, July 28, 2012 – January 6, 2013, no cat.

World War I and the Rise of Modernism. Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, MO, January 9 – October 18, 2015, no cat.

Gallery Label

Edward Steichen had many careers in photography: as an artist, a highly successful portrait and fashion photographer, as a military photographer, and as a museum curator. During World War I, he served in the American Expeditionary Forces and became part of the Photographic Division in France. In this role, Steichen oversaw aerial photography, helping train pilots to use cameras and equipment during their reconnaissance missions. This work was made to provide strategic information. However, the abstract visual qualities of the image also relate to modern art movements of this era.

Provenance

Inherited from the artist by Joanna Taub Steichen, Montauk, NY (1933-2010), 1973;
Purchased from Susan Ehrens, Emeryville, CA by Hallmark Cards, Inc. Kansas City, MO, 1997;
Given by Hallmark Cards, Inc. to The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, MO, 2005.

Published References

Keith F. Davis, Jane L. Aspinwall, and April M. Watson. Heartland: The Photographs of Terry Evans. With contributions by Kaitlyn Bunch and Terry Evans. Kansas City, MO: Hall Family Foundation in association with the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, 2012. Distributed by Yale University Press. Published in conjunction with an exhibition of the same name, shown at the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, 51 (repro).

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