id: 159905 accession number: 1997.195 share license status: Copyrighted url: https://clevelandart.org/art/1997.195 updated: 2025-02-09 05:24:05.385000 Snake in Bucket, 1929. Imogen Cunningham (American, 1883–1976). Gelatin silver print; image: 16.6 x 21.5 cm (6 9/16 x 8 7/16 in.); paper: 19.8 x 26.5 cm (7 13/16 x 10 7/16 in.); matted: 40.6 x 50.8 cm (16 x 20 in.). The Cleveland Museum of Art, John L. Severance Fund 1997.195 © The Imogen Cunningham Trust title: Snake in Bucket title in original language: series: series in original language: creation date: 1929 creation date earliest: 1929 creation date latest: 1929 current location: creditline: John L. Severance Fund copyright: © The Imogen Cunningham Trust --- culture: America technique: gelatin silver print department: Photography collection: PH - American 1900-1950 type: Photograph find spot: catalogue raisonne: --- CREATORS * Imogen Cunningham (American, 1883–1976) - artist Imogen Cunningham American, 1883-1976 Born in Portland, Oregon, Imogen Cunningham became one of America's most admired photographers during a career that spanned seven decades. She took her first photographs in Seattle in 1901 and later worked for photographer Edward S. Curtis (1907-9). While assisting in Curtis's studio, Cunningham learned the platinum printing process, a technique she used for the soft-focus pictorial style she then favored. In 1910, upon her return to Seattle after a year studying photographic chemistry at the Technische Hochschule in Dresden, Cunningham opened a portrait studio. She moved to San Francisco with her husband, Roi Partridge, in 1917 and in the 1920s began a series of sharply focused, closeup studies of plant forms. Emphasizing light, form, and abstract pattern, these images were included in Film und Foto, the influential exhibition of avant-garde photography and film held in Stuttgart in 1929. Three years later, Cunningham joined Ansel Adams, Edward Weston, Willard Van Dyke, and others in forming Group f/64. Throughout her long career Cunningham exhibited her work widely and was featured in several documentaries. Among retrospectives of her photography were Imogen! Imogen Cunningham Photographs 1910-1973, at the Henry Art Gallery, University of Washington (1974), and A Centennial Selection at the California Academy of Arts and Sciences, San Francisco (1983). Her subject matter ranged from portraits and closeup studies of plants, flowers, and nudes to unconventional views of modern architecture. Portraiture, however, held special interest. When Cunningham died in 1976, she was working on a book featuring portraits of people over 90 years of age (published posthumously in 1977 as After Ninety). M.M. --- measurements: Image: 16.6 x 21.5 cm (6 9/16 x 8 7/16 in.); Paper: 19.8 x 26.5 cm (7 13/16 x 10 7/16 in.); Matted: 40.6 x 50.8 cm (16 x 20 in.) state of the work: edition of the work: support materials: inscriptions: --- CURRENT EXHIBITIONS title: Icons of American Photography: A Century of Photographs from the Cleveland Museum of Art opening date: 2007-06-24T00:00:00 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). --- LEGACY EXHIBITIONS * {'description': 'The Metropolitan Museum of Art, April 24 - July 2, 1973: "Photographs by Imogen Cunningham," listed no. 23 in exhibition catalogue.', 'opening_date': '1973-04-24T00:00:00'} * {'description': 'The Cleveland Museum of Art (6/24/07 - 9/16/07); "Icons of American Photography: A Century of Photographs from the Cleveland Museum of Art", no exhibition catalogue.', 'opening_date': '2007-06-24T00:00:00'} --- PROVENANCE --- fun fact: digital description: wall description: --- RELATED WORKS --- CITATIONS Cleveland Museum of Art, “Major European Porcelain Crucifix, Pre-Columbian Figure, and Other Works Added to CMA Collection,” December 3, 1997, Cleveland Museum of Art Archives. page number: url: https://archive.org/details/cmapr4165 --- IMAGES