The Letterbox

1894

Alfred Stieglitz

Artist, American, 1864 - 1946

Media Options

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Artwork overview

  • Medium

    platinum print

  • Credit Line

    Alfred Stieglitz Collection

  • Dimensions

    sheet (trimmed to image): 21.1 × 15.9 cm (8 5/16 × 6 1/4 in.)
    page size: 34.8 × 27 cm (13 11/16 × 10 5/8 in.)

  • Accession

    1949.3.155

  • Stieglitz Estate Number

    61C

    Part of Stieglitz Key Set Online Edition

    Learn more
  • Key Set Number

    181

Alfred Stieglitz

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Artwork history & notes

Provenance

Georgia O'Keeffe; gift to NGA, 1949.

Associated Names

Bibliography

2002

  • Greenough, Sarah. Alfred Stieglitz: The Key Set: The Alfred Stieglitz Collection of Photographs. Washington, 2002: vol. 1, cat. 181.

Inscriptions

by Alfred Stieglitz, on interleaving tissue, lower right, in graphite: "The Letterbox."

Wikidata ID

Q64037757

Scholarly Remarks and Key Set Data

Remarks

For Stieglitz's description of Gutach, where this view was made, see Key Set number 171.

Other Collections

A print corresponding with this photograph can also be found in the following collection(s):

Collection of Michael Mattis and Judith Hochberg, New York (signed, titled, and dated on the overmat)

National Gallery of Art, Washington, 2006.3.1.9

Richard and Ellen Sandor Family Collection (inscribed: The Letterbox—Alfred Stieglitz / Original Platinum Print—1894)

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:

1895, Paris (no. 574, as La Boîte aux lettres, platinum)
1895, Bridgeport (as Letterbox)
1896, Berlin (as Am Briefkasten [The Letter Box])
1896, New York, The Camera Club of New York (as The Letter Box, lantern slide)
1897, New York, Knickerbocker (as The Letter Box, lantern slide)
1898, New York, American Institute (no. 184, as The Letter Box, silver medal)
1898, Philadelphia (no. 200, as The Letter-box)
1899, New York (no. 7, as The Letterbox, 1894–1899, platinum direct)
1934, New York (no. 14, as The Letterbox, 1894)

Lifetime Publications

A reproduction of this work appeared in the following publication(s) during Alfred Stieglitz’s lifetime:

The Photographic Times 26 (January 1895): opp. 1 (ill., A Happy New Year)

Picturesque Bits of New York and Other Studies (New York, 1897): unnumbered (ill., The Letter Box, photogravure)

Camera Notes 2:1 (July 1898): 11 (ill., untitled)

Charles DeKay, “The Photographer As Artist,” The New York Times Illustrated Magazine (4 June 1899): 7 (ill., The Letter Box)

Theodore Dreiser, “The Camera Club of New York,” Ainslee’s Magazine 4 (October 1899): 330 (ill., The Letter Box)


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