University of Virginia Art Museum
Man Ray
African Art & the Modernist Lens
August 7 – October 10, 2010
Man Ray, Noire et Blanche (negative image), 1926.
Man Ray, African Art, and the Modernist Lens brings to light photographs of African objects by American artist Man Ray (1890–1976) produced over a period of almost twenty years. In addition to providing fresh insight into Man Ray’s photographic practice, the exhibition raises questions concerning the representation, reception, and perception of African art as mediated by the camera lens and features photographs by Man Ray from the 1920s and 1930s and by his international avant-garde contemporaries such as Charles Sheeler, Walker Evans, Alfred Stieglitz, and André Kertész. For the first time, a number of these photographs are presented alongside the original African objects they feature. The juxtaposition offers a rare opportunity to encounter first-hand how various photographic techniques of framing, lighting, camera angle, and cropping evoke radically different interpretations of these objects. Books, avant-garde journals, and popular magazines also on display illustrate how these photographs circulated and promoted ideas about African art and culture to an international audience. |