Sun Rays—Paula, Berlin
1889, printed 1916
Artist, American, 1864 - 1946
Artwork overview
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Medium
platinum print
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Credit Line
-
Dimensions
image: 23.2 x 18.5 cm (9 1/8 x 7 5/16 in.)
sheet: 25.4 x 20.3 cm (10 x 8 in.) -
Accession
1949.3.57
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Stieglitz Estate Number
55E
Part of Stieglitz Key Set Online Edition
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Key Set Number
60
Alfred Stieglitz
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Artwork history & notes
Provenance
Georgia O'Keeffe; gift to NGA, 1949.
Associated Names
Exhibition History
1983
Photographs by Alfred Stieglitz, National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC, February 3–May 8, 1983; Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, June 17–August 14, 1983; The Art Institute of Chicago, October 18, 1983–January 3, 1984
1992
Stieglitz in the Darkroom, National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC, October 4, 1992–February 14, 1993
2002
Alfred Stieglitz: Known and Unknown, National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC, June 2–September 2, 2002; The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, October 6, 2002–January 5, 2003
2015
In Light of the Past: Celebrating Twenty-Five Years of Collecting Photographs at the National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC, May 3–July 26, 2015
Bibliography
1947
Cramer, Konrad. "Stupendous Stieglitz." PSA Journal 13 (November 1947): 723.
1950
Norman, Dorothy. "Alfred Stieglitz on Photography.” Magazine of Art 43 (December 1950): 300.
1973
Norman, Dorothy. Alfred Stieglitz: An American Seer. New York, 1973: 1.
1983
Greenough, Sarah, and Juan Hamilton. Alfred Stieglitz: Photographs and Writings. Washington, 1983: no. 3, pl. 8.
1990
Paulson, Ronald. Figure and Abstraction in Contemporary Painting. New Brunswick and London, 1990: repro. 141.
2002
Greenough, Sarah. Alfred Stieglitz: The Key Set: The Alfred Stieglitz Collection of Photographs. Washington, 2002: vol. 1, cat. 60.
Inscriptions
by Alfred Stieglitz, on mount, lower left, in graphite: Sun Rays—Paula—(Paulstrasse, Berlin) 1889.— / Print 1916. Alfred Stieglitz — / A1 Print
Wikidata ID
Q64034665
Scholarly Remarks and Key Set Data
Remarks
The photographs hanging on the wall are, from left to right, top row: The Approaching Storm (illustrated in Die Photographische Rundschau 3:7 [1888], frontispiece), Paula (location unknown, illustrated in Sotheby’s, New York, auction catalogue, 9 November 1976, lot 174), The Approaching Storm (see above); middle row: Paula (location unknown); portrait of Stieglitz (by an unknown photographer); and bottom row: Paula (location unknown). In the mirror is another print of Paula (see above).
Stieglitz may have submitted this image to The Amateur Photographer’s “Travelling Studentship Competition” as A Study in Light and Shade. The journal notes: “all the negatives are un-retouched, and no cloud negatives are used. They have been taken with a Steinheil Aplanat. The plates used include Obernetter, Eosine, Schlenssn, Perulz (eosine), and Lumière. The developers have been pyro and soda and iron, and the whole of the prints have been produced in platinotype” (The Amateur Photographer 12 [18 July 1890], 41).
The woman shown here is probably Stieglitz’s lover, Paula Bauschmied, who lived in Munich and with whom Stieglitz had a daughter (Georgia O’Keeffe to the law firm of Lowenstein, Pitcher, Spence, Hotchkiss, Amann & Parr, 19 January 1956, private collection).
Stieglitz Collections
A corresponding print was given to the following institution(s) by Alfred Stieglitz during his lifetime, or was received or acquired from the estate:
Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Yale University, New Haven, YCAL MSS 85, box 132 [lantern slide] (inscribed: Sun Rays [Berlin, 1889])
Other Collections
A print corresponding with this photograph can also be found in the following collection(s):
Amon Carter Museum, Fort Worth
Location unknown (inscribed: Paula— / 1889 Berlin)
Lifetime Exhibitions
A print from the same negative—perhaps a photograph from the Gallery’s collection—appeared in the following exhibition(s) during Alfred Stieglitz’s lifetime:
possibly 1891, Hartford (no. 76, as Study in Light and Shade)
possibly 1891, New York, Fourth Annual Joint Exhibition (no. 306, as Study in Light and Shade)
possibly 1891, New York, Society of Amateur Photographers (no. 223, as Study in Light and Shade)
1921, New York (no. 3, as Sunlight and Shadow, 1889)
1934, New York (no. 5, as Sun Rays, Berlin, 1889)
1937, New York, American Place (no. 16, as Sun Rays, 1889)
1942, New York (as Paula, sometimes titled “Sunrays” or “Lights and Shadows,” Berlin, 1889)
Lifetime Publications
A reproduction of this work appeared in the following publication(s) during Alfred Stieglitz’s lifetime:
Waldo Frank et al., America & Alfred Stieglitz (New York, 1934): pl. 31b (ill., Light and Shadows, 1887)
E. M. Benson, “Alfred Stieglitz: The Man and the Book,” American Magazine of Art 28 (January 1935): 39 (ill., Light and Shadow, Berlin, 1887)
Robert W. Marks, “Man with a Cause,” Coronet 4 (September 1938): 168 (ill., Light and Shadow, 1889)
Robert W. Marks, “Stieglitz—Patriarch of Photography,” Popular Photography 6 (April 1940): 21 (ill., Paula—Sun Rays)
“High Card,” Time 41 (11 January 1943): 44 (ill., Paula)
“Speaking of Pictures . . . These are by one of Photography’s Pioneers,” Life 14:14 (5 April 1943): 6 (ill., Paula, 1889)