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After World War I, Paris was teeming with Americans. Bon vivants seeking to escape Prohibition mingled with artists and intellectuals, all pursuing their dreams in the City of Light. The American modernist Man Ray (1890–1976) spent the 1920s and 1930s in Paris, where experimental expression was flourishing. Although he considered himself first and foremost a painter and also worked in film, sculpture, and collage, his best-known and most innovative medium was photography.
Man Ray arrived in Paris in 1921, brimming with creative energy. Inspired by Marcel Duchamp’s “readymades”—everyday objects that become works of art in a gallery setting—Man Ray spontaneously created an assemblage at a party by combining thumbtacks and an iron, which he then photographed. Shortly thereafter, he began experimenting with camera-less photography and created his Rayographs, abstract images produced by placing objects directly on photographic paper and exposing it to light.
He eventually became an influential figure in the city’s avant-garde circles and began producing striking portraits of numerous prominent figures, including Pablo Picasso, James Joyce, Jean Cocteau, Joan Miró, and Gertrude Stein. His work inspired other photographers and encouraged painters—including the Surrealists René Magritte and Salvador Dalí—to experiment with the medium.
Published by J. Paul Getty Museum, 2011
128 pages
ISBN: 978-1606060605
After World War I, Paris was teeming with Americans. Bon vivants seeking to escape Prohibition mingled with artists and intellectuals, all pursuing their dreams in the City of Light. The American modernist Man Ray (1890–1976) spent the 1920s and 1930s in Paris, where experimental expression was flourishing. Although he considered himself first and foremost a painter and also worked in film, sculpture, and collage, his best-known and most innovative medium was photography.
Man Ray arrived in Paris in 1921, brimming with creative energy. Inspired by Marcel Duchamp’s “readymades”—everyday objects that become works of art in a gallery setting—Man Ray spontaneously created an assemblage at a party by combining thumbtacks and an iron, which he then photographed. Shortly thereafter, he began experimenting with camera-less photography and created his Rayographs, abstract images produced by placing objects directly on photographic paper and exposing it to light.
He eventually became an influential figure in the city’s avant-garde circles and began producing striking portraits of numerous prominent figures, including Pablo Picasso, James Joyce, Jean Cocteau, Joan Miró, and Gertrude Stein. His work inspired other photographers and encouraged painters—including the Surrealists René Magritte and Salvador Dalí—to experiment with the medium.
Published by J. Paul Getty Museum, 2011
128 pages
ISBN: 978-1606060605