The Allen presents changing exhibitions along with engaging guest speakers and public programs.
Learn MoreThe Allen's collection is particularly strong in 17th century Dutch and Flemish painting, Japanese prints, early modern art, African art, and more.
Learn MoreExplore the full range of museum programs through free events, guided and self-guided tours, and resources for professors and PreK-12 teachers.
Learn MoreResources
Find podcasts, activities, and information for all age groups.
Support for the museum continues our tradition of bringing art to the people.
Learn MoreJanuary 2, 2024 - January 18, 2025
In Ripin Gallery
January 2, 2024 - January 18, 2025
In Ripin Gallery
Drawn from the Allen’s collection, this exhibition spans more than 150 years. Although far from comprehensive, the loosely chronological presentation encompasses key practitioners and decisive moments in the history of photography.
From the mid-19th century to the first decades of the 20th, there was widespread debate as to whether photography should be considered a fine art rather than a mechanical trade. The exhibition opens with practitioners who took advantage of this ambiguity to enter the field and make crucial discoveries, largely through portraiture. Works on view from the 1920s to the 1950s show how photographers used the unique characteristics of the medium to document the quintessentially modernist processes of urbanization, infrastructure, and scientific discovery.
The second half of the exhibition focuses on strategies of appropriation and collage from the post-World War II period to the present, foregrounding the effects of mass media. Alongside these concerns, photographers developed conceptual modes of portraiture to address identity-based issues.
This is the second installment of the multi-year series Femme ’n isms, which highlights femme and women-identified artists in the Allen’s collection and expands art-historical notions of the feminine through the intersections of gender, race, and class. The exhibition includes works by Berenice Abbott, Laura Aguilar, Margaret Bourke-White, Claude Cahun, Julia Margaret Cameron, Nan Goldin, Dorothea Lange, Barbara Norfleet, Cindy Sherman, Iiu Susiraja, Carrie Mae Weems, and others.
Images:
Cindy Sherman (American, b. 1954), Untitled Film Still #53 (Blonde: Close-Up with Lamp), 1980, Gift of Donald Droll in honor of Chloe Hamilton Young, 1984.18.
Claude Cahun (French, 1894–1954), Untitled (Self-Portrait), 1927, Horace W. Goldsmith Foundation Photography Fund, 1992.12.
Ellen Johnson ’33 Curator of Modern and Contemporary Art
Try the Allen App
Free narrated tours, object labels, music, and more—all on your own cell phone or device.
Newsletter
Sign up for our e-newsletter to get information about our free events and latest exhibitions.
Join & Support
Your support makes a difference. Become a museum member, donor, or volunteer.
