Getty Museum

Photograph - New York [Blind Woman]

Date

negative 1916; print 1917

Medium

Photogravure

Culture

American

Department

Photographs

Institution

Getty Museum

This portrait of a blind woman, which is part of a series of works Paul Strand made with a false-lens camera (see also [89.XM.1.1](https://www.getty.edu/art/collection/object/104EB5)), is unsettling for several reasons. The whole idea of a false lens is unnecessary in this situation, given, as the viewer is led to believe from the sign, that this woman is blind and therefore presumably unable to see the photographer and his camera. Yet, there is uncertainty as to whether or not she has any vision in her left eye, which looks beyond the right frame of the composition. Strand forces the viewer to confront this woman and her plight; looking at her in this bold manner challenges us to acknowledge her presence, whereas on the street we might ordinarily ignore her. Although her existence has been recorded by the city, whose issuance of the metal medallion gives the woman license to peddle, it has effectively reduced her identity to a simple number. This portrait was published as a photogravure print in the June 1917 issue of _Camera Work_. It was the final volume in this long-running journal, which had been launched by Alfred Stieglitz in 1903. Stieglitz had already championed the work of Strand in a previous number from 1916, stating: "His work is pure. It is direct. It does not rely upon tricks of process." Now he devoted the entire final issue to Strand, whose essay "Photography" also appeared within the pages of the deluxe publication. Echoing the words of Stieglitz, Strand said: "Honesty, no less than intensity of vision, is the prerequisite of a living expression. This means a real respect for the thing in front of him [the photographer], expressed in terms of chiaroscuro (color and photography have nothing in common) through a range of almost infinite tonal values, which lie beyond the skill of human hand. The fullest realization of this is accomplished without tricks of process or manipulation, through the use of straight photographic methods." For Strand, the false lens was not contradictory to straight photography—if anything, it allowed him to present a more honest and intense living expression. Originally published in _Paul Strand_, In Focus: Photographs from the J. Paul Getty Museum by Anne M. Lyden (Los Angeles: J. Paul Getty Museum, 2005), 24. ©2005, J. Paul Getty Trust.

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