Getty Museum
Pony Express Museum, Arcadia, CA
Creator
Man RayAmerican Photographer · 1890–1976
All works by this person →Born in Philadelphia, Emmanuel Radnitsky grew up in New Jersey and became a commercial artist in New York in the 1910s. He began to sign his name *Man Ray* in 1912, although his family did not change its surname to *Ray* until the 1920s. He initially taught himself photography in order to reproduce his own works of art, which included paintings and mixed media. In 1921 he moved to Paris and set up
More on Getty ULAN- Date
- 1940s
- Medium
- Gelatin silver print
- Culture
- American
- Department
- Photographs
- Institution
- Getty Museum
When Man Ray wrote to his niece around 1940 that "there was more Surrealism rampant in Hollywood than all the Surrealists could invent in a lifetime," he could probably have expanded those geographical borders to include this curious museum commemorating the Pony Express. Located about fifteen miles from Los Angeles in Arcadia, a town named for the ancient Greek district said to symbolize pastoral beauty, the oddity of this monument to a brief moment in American history must have appealed to Man Ray's appreciation of the absurd. The Pony Express mail service between Saint Joseph, Missouri, and Sacramento, California, lasted only eighteen months. It was a financial failure but gained its infamy from its most famous, colorful riders: William ("Buffalo Bill") Cody and "Pony Bob" Haslam.
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