1Lugon
For my contribution to the book Object:Photo. Modern
Photographs 1909–1949. The Thomas Walther Collection at
The Museum of Modern Art, I focused on the various and
at times conflicting definitions of what constituted an exhibition
print — whether ephemeral, interchangeable object
or singular work of art — in the major German exhibitions
that took place during the late 1920s, primary among them
the famous Film und Foto — or Fifo — in Stuttgart in 1929.1
In
the course of my research, a parallel question immediately
arose: could we identify which photographs in the Thomas
Walther Collection had been included in these exhibitions?
Given the reproducible medium that photography is, the
question proved twofold at the outset: had some of the
motifs of the collection been presented in these exhibitions?
And were some of the specific prints themselves hung in
these exhibitions? The former seemed very probable, the
latter more difficult to establish. In addition, there was the
broader question of the epistemological worth of such
investigations: what would this sort of work of identification
tell us about the history of photography and its exhibition,
a question considered in my essay in Object:Photo?
To clarify this collection’s relationships with exhibitions
that are nearly a century old and poorly documented
involved work in two directions: a close examination of
the prints themselves in search of possible traces of public
display, and a more general return to these exhibitions to try
to specify the way in which the images had actually been
treated, mounted, hung, and eventually conserved. These
cross investigations took the form of two complementary
research trips: a stay at MoMA to examine the pieces in the
collection, and the exploration of several German archives
and collections to gather the maximum amount of information
on these exhibitions and to look at other prints possibly
related to them.2
To avoid getting lost in the large number of exhibitions
and fairs having to do, directly or indirectly, with photography
in the last years of the Weimar Republic, we decided
to focus on the two main overviews of New Photography
organized in 1929: Fotografie der Gegenwart (Photography of
the present) at the Museum Folkwang in Essen and Film
und Foto organized by the Deutscher Werkbund in Stuttgart,
as well as the various shows directly connected to them.
These related shows include the many stages of their trav-­­
eling versions as well as partial reprises or derivative
presentations. For example, Film und Foto was partially inte­-
grated into Das Lichtbild (Photography) in Munich in
Prints from the Thomas Walther Collection and
German Exhibitions around 1930
O l i v i e r Lu g o n
1930, itself reprised in Die neue Fotografie (The new photography)
in Basel in 1931, and the organizers of Fotografie der
Gegenwart amplified their first project with Das Lichtbild Essen
(Photography Essen) in 1931. Ultimately, the two major
exhibitions of 1929 had a presence in twenty different venues
(see Appendix), with the addition of several stages that
were announced but not documented.
Exhibition Views
A persistent fog continues to envelop these exhibitions,
which are so famous and so commented upon but whose
very celebrity makes us forget how little we know about them.
Available sources prove surprisingly scarce considering the
publicity they enjoyed at the time and their luster even today.
The destruction from World War II explains this in part, especially
since Stuttgart and Essen, large industrial centers,
fig. 1  Cover of Gustaf Stotz, et al. Internationale Ausstellung des Deutschen Werkbunds
Film und Foto (International exhibition of the Deutsche Werkbund Film und Foto).
Exhibition catalogue. Stuttgart: Deutscher Werkbund, 1929. The Museum of Modern
Art Library, New York
2Lugon
were particularly affected by Allied bombardment. But the
status of the photographic exhibition of the era, an ephemeral
and shifting event that assembled prints of little value at
the time, only reinforced this volatility.
The extreme scarcity of installation views remains the
principal enigma today. Not a single image conserved in an
institution shows the hanging of Fotografie der Gegenwart
in Essen; only the stop in Magdeburg is documented by eight
views (found in the Stadtarchiv Magdeburg) and the one in
Dresden by three views (in the Deutsche Fotothek, Dresden).
Likewise, there is no known exhibition view of Das Lichtbild
in Munich, and just a single view of the entrance of Das
Lichtbild Essen (for a reproduction, see, for example, Film und
Foto der Zwanziger Jahre).3
As for Fifo in Stuttgart, its documentation could not be
more disparate, depending on the section. Nine of the
thirteen rooms — indeed, more than two thirds of the show
(see the exhibition map in fig. 1) — have no visual trace.
Only the first four offer a few views, but in a very uneven
way. The most famous room, Room 1, conceived by László
Moholy-Nagy, is best known by an overall view that is
often reproduced, in addition to a view of the left wall reproduced
in small format in the Italian magazine Casabella
in 1941.4
A search at the Stuttgarter Stadtarchiv turned up
two new images, both published in Schwäbisches Bilderblatt,
an illustrated weekly supplement in the Stuttgarter neuen
Tagblatt. One reproduces the general preexisting point of view
but stretches it out, revealing the right wall and a new portion
of the left wall, as well as the presence of an electric cable
on the back wall that indicates that the large panel on X-rays
was lit from behind and therefore quite prominent (fig. 2).5
The other, taken during the opening reception, reveals part
of the section devoted to early photography, along with the
presence, unknown until now, of display cases (fig. 3).6
Room 4, representing the Soviet Union and assembled
by El Lissitzky, was also the subject of a famous installation
view: it highlights Fifo’s only real attempt to integrate
photography and film in the same space, with its automatic
Duoskop viewing devices and the use, once again, of rearprojection
for strips of enlarged photograms (fig. 4). Here,
too, another view, of lesser quality and published less often,
provides some information about the left wall (fig. 5).
fig. 2  Film und Foto exhibition, Stuttgart, 1929. Installation view of Room 1.
Exhibition design by László Moholy-Nagy. Reproduced in Schwäbisches Bilderblatt:
Wochenschrift zum Stuttgarter neuen Tagblatt, no. 23 (June 7, 1929). Stadtarchiv
Stuttgart. © 2014 Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York
fig. 3  Film und Foto exhibition, Stuttgart, 1929. Installation view of Room 1.
Exhibition design by László Moholy-Nagy. Reproduced in Schwäbisches Bilderblatt:
Wochenschrift zum Stuttgarter neuen Tagblatt, no. 22 (May 31, 1929). Stadtarchiv
Stuttgart. © 2014 Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York
3Lugon
fig. 6  Film und Foto exhibition, Stuttgart, 1929. Installation view of Room 3, the
John Heartfield room. Exhibition design by John Heartfield. Archiv John Heartfield,
no. 619, Akademie der Künste Berlin
fig. 5  Film und Foto exhibition, Stuttgart, 1929. Installation view of Room 4,
the Soviet room. Exhibition design by El Lissitzky. The Getty Research Institute,
Los Angeles. © 2014 Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York
fig. 4  Film und Foto exhibition, Stuttgart, 1929. Installation view of Room 4,
the Soviet room. Exhibition design by El Lissitzky. The Getty Research Institute,
Los Angeles. © 2014 Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York
4Lugon
In contrast to these very summary traces of the two
sections that were most celebrated by contemporaries, is
the sudden plethora of views documenting Room 3, belonging
to John Heartfield, with no less than twenty-two images
conserved in the Heartfield collection at the Akademie
der Künste in Berlin, detailing each wall and each vitrine
(fig. 6). All of them are credited on the back to the same
photographer: “A. Ohler, Stuttgart.” This was Arthur Ohler
(1883–1973), a professional photographer, himself represented
by five works in the show and by an advertising
insert in the catalogue, and to whom the views of Room
1 in Schwäbisches Bilderblatt are also attributed.7
It seems
unlikely that he was called upon by either Heartfield or the
Werkbund to pay particular attention to Room 3 and to
remain parsimonious about the other sections, but more
likely that he produced as detailed a report on the whole
exhibition. Unfortunately, while I was able to find traces of
his collection, it has been reduced over the years due to
various relocations and no longer include any installation
views of Fifo.8
The same was true for the old photo archives
of the Stuttgarter neuen Tagblatt and its illustrated supple-
ment.9
Yet, a few additional pieces of information may
be drawn from the views that allow a glance at the adjacent
spaces, whether the hanging of Sasha and Cami Stone’s
works in Room 2 or Moholy-Nagy’s own works in Room 5.
Moreover, some views of the later venues give an
idea of the changes that occurred over the course of
Fifo’s various permutations as it traveled. The Medien
und Informationszentrum of the Zürcher Hochschule der
Künste holds four views of the Zurich installation and the
Kunstbibliothek in Berlin three views of the show in that
city. A view of a room in Vienna was also published
sev­eral times during this period.10
A comparison of these
views allows us to establish that the cardboards and even
certain prints were replaced in the course of relocation.
Indeed, each new stage specifically reconsidered the core
of Stuttgart and requires us to speak of Film und Foto as
exhibitions in the plural.
Publications and Archives
In addition to this visual material, we have original written
sources. Fifo was the object of significant editorial
production, with four specific catalogues for the different
installations in Stuttgart, Zurich, Berlin, and Vienna,
as well as several complementary volumes — the album
Foto-Auge by Franz Roh and Jan Tschichold, and the two
programm­atic books Es kommt der neue Fotograf! (Here
comes the new photographer!) by Werner Gräff and
Filmgegner von heute — Filmfreunde von morgen (Enemy of
film today — Friend of film tomorrow) by Hans Richter.11
In the end, no less than seven publications accompanied
the event, not including the additional catalogues of
Das Lichtbild in Munich and Die neue Fotografie in Basel.
Unfortunately, beyond offering the names of the photographers,
the information provided in these volumes is limited
fig. 7  Pamphlet for the exhibition Fotografie der Gegenwart (Contemporary
photography), Essen, 1929. Graphic design by Max Burchartz. Thomas J. Watson
Library, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York
fig. 8  Pamphlet for the exhibition Fotografie der Gegenwart (Contemporary
photography), Magdeburg, 1929. Graphic design by Walter Dexel. The Museum
of Modern Art, New York. Jan Tschichold Collection
regarding the details of the works presented and even more
so regarding the display. Fotografie der Gegenwart and Das
Lichtbild Essen fare even worse, deprived of any catalogues
at all. Nevertheless, lists of exhibitors do appear in various
brochures produced for each stage of Fotografie der Gegenwart
(figs. 7 and 8). They confirm the extent to which content
could vary over the course of relocation (figs. 9 and 10).
The many reviews in the mainstream and specialized
press supplement these descriptions. More than the
publications, they inform us about the specifics of the various
displays. Indeed, many discuss, even if briefly, hanging
options, types of montage, the formats of the prints or the
quality of the papers, elements often overlooked in the criticism
of photographic exhibitions. In this, they demonstrate
how decisions about hangings could elicit surprise, and
they confirm the pertinence of examining these elements
as discursive choices in and of themselves.12
5Lugon
Correspondence also proves valuable in reconstructing
the history of the preparations for these exhibitions. The
archives of the Deutscher Werkbund in Berlin unfortunately
kept none of the exchanges connected to the set-up of Fifo,
just as the archives of individuals directly involved in its completion,
like Hans Hildbrandt or Bernhard Pankok, members
of the selection committee, or Ernst Schneidler, in charge
of scenography, yield nothing either.13
It is the collections of
art or photography historians a priori more marginally connected
to the event that prove the most helpful in better
understanding the issues of the photographic exhibitions of
the period. The voluminous correspondence of Carl Georg
Heise reveals the deep engagement, with and around him, of
a network of art historians in these projects, something also
confirmed by the archives of Erich Stenger, a collector and
historian of photography courted for a number of these exhi-
bitions.14
The archives of Sigfried Giedion, in particular, allow
us to measure the important investment of the Swiss historian
of art and architecture in the preparatory discussions
of Fifo, which went well beyond the Zurich venue and even
contributed to shaping the program in Stuttgart.15
The best primary source for Das Lichtbild in Munich
is undoubtedly the Stadtarchiv München, and for Fotografie
der Gegenwart the Museum Folkwang in Essen, the organizer
of the exhibition in 1929.16
The museum’s department
of photography amassed a wealth of documentation on
the event, particularly in recent years, in preparation for a
possible re-creation. Undertaken by Ute Eskildsen and Petra
Steinhardt, this documentation has come to complete
the papers assembled by Eskildsen on Film und Foto in 1979,
on the occasion of the fiftieth anniversary of the show, in
preparation for the exhibition and book Film und Foto der
Zwanziger Jahre, which remains the definitive study on the
subject to this day.17
fig. 9  Fotografie der Gegenwart (Contemporary photography) exhibition, Magdeburg,
1929. Installation view. Exhibition design by Xanti Schawinsky. Stadtarchiv Magdeburg
fig. 10  Fotografie der Gegenwart (Contemporary photography) exhibition, Dresden,
1929. Installation view. Deutsche Fotothek, Dresden
6Lugon
Ubiquitous Images, Singular Objects
Another important source of information about these
exhibitions is found in the prints themselves, at once objects
of study and tools with which to reconstruct the history of
their public life. The many indications on the verso of the
photographs primarily give clues about their production (the
stamp or signature of the photographer, a handwritten legend
or date, the logo of the paper manufacturer) and about
their circulation in printed form (stamps from the news
agency, newspaper, or publisher, instructions for cropping or
the size of the reproduction). Their presentation in an exhibition
leaves fewer written specifications, but other signs
allow us to assume a hanging. The large size of some paper
suggests this, as do marks left by pins or glue. On the other
hand, such signs do little to help specify a date or place.
Possible evidence on cardboard backing or mat proves
essential then. While collectors often get rid of these in favor
of a uniform presentation of works in their collections,
luckily for several pieces in the Walther Collection these
remain intact.
This is notably the case with two works by Oskar
Nerlinger, one of which, Motorcycle in the Race (Motorrad
im Rennen) (fig. 11), proves particularly rich in contextual
information. This print was sandwiched between two solid
pieces of cardboard and equipped with two hooks for easy
hanging, clearly indicating that the image was intended
for multiple installations. The mount was meant to be seen
as a whole, since there was a legend at the very bottom
of the cardboard, with a number referring to a guide or a
catalogue, suggesting the likely presence of other, similar
arrangements. It turns out that the number in question, 555,
falls exactly in the Oskar Nerlinger section of the catalogue
for Fifo in Stuttgart (nos. 546–56), even though Motorcycle
in the Race is labeled number 546, which would suggest a
permutation during the likely itinerancy of the image.18
Two
stamps from customs on the back of the piece confirm its
mobility (fig. 12). One comes from Zagreb, the other from
Yokohama, the large Japanese port in Tokyo Bay — both
locations to which Fifo traveled. Everything points then to
the fact that the print in question is indeed the one from the
fig. 11  Oskar Nerlinger. Motorcycle in the Race (Motorrad im Rennen), front with mount.
Gelatin silver print, 1925–28. Image: 8 11/16 × 6 7/8" (22 × 17.4 cm); mount: 18 7/8 × 12 13/16"
(48 × 32.5 cm). The Museum of Modern Art, New York. Thomas Walther Collection.
Abbott-Levy Collection funds, by exchange (MoMA 1798.2001).
© Sigrid Nerlinger
fig. 12  Oskar Nerlinger. Motorcycle in the Race (Motorrad im Rennen), back of mount
with hooks. See fig. 11.
7Lugon
famous exhibition of 1929 and that its cardboard backing
was used on the tour, or at least for part of it.19
No other piece in the Walther Collection offers such
clues, allowing one to reliably identify it as a print included
in one of these exhibitions. Close to forty percent of the photographers
represented in the collection participated in
one or another of the major German exhibitions of 1929–31.
Some of the same images were assuredly present there,
and at times in several exhibitions at once — as was the case,
for example, with Ficus elastica (Gummibaum) by Aenne
Biermann (MoMA 1617.2001) and Lotte (Eye) (Lotte [Auge])
by Max Burchartz (MoMA 1646.2001), whose prints found
themselves in both Fifo and Fotografie der Gegenwart. But
photographic reproducibility was able to give some pictures
an almost ubiquitous presence, even though every
object shown was nonetheless fundamentally singular. This
is noticeable, for example, with Lotte (Eye): the cropping
of the print in the Walther Collection is slightly different
from the one in the Kunstbibliothek in Berlin, which
was acquired in the wake of Fifo, and even more unlike one
of the two in the Museum Folkwang, for which Burchartz
erased his daughter’s freckles. Similarly, the New York copies
of Moscow Illuminations Celebrating the Tenth Anniversary
of the Russian Revolution (Moskva noch’iu v oktiabr’skie dni)
fig. 13  Film und Foto exhibition, Zurich, 1929. Installation view of Soviet section.
Medien- und Informationszentrum de la Zürcher Hochschule der Künste, Zurich
by Roman Karmen (MoMA 1712.2001) and In the Gallery
(GUM, State Department Store, Moscow) (Auf der Galerie
[GUM, Staatliches Kaufhaus, Moskau]) by Semyon Fridlyand
(MoMA 1671.2001) differ enough in their size and/or cropping
from versions presented at Fifo so as to be perceptible
in installation views of Zurich and Berlin (figs. 13 and 14).
All the tension specific to photography is situated here
and accounts for the complexity of the medium’s relationship
with exhibition. As an image, a photograph gives the
impression of proliferating while always remaining the
same, but as an object, a silver print is nonetheless a handcrafted
product, not a mass-produced one. Above all, its
very exhibition reinforces the uniqueness of its presence in
a particular place at a particular time, sometimes greatly
varying the conditions of its visibility and reception. The
history of photography exhibitions may therefore be studied
as the history of a fundamental tension between image
and object, and the major exhibitions of the late 1920s,
through the extreme concentration of their succession,
on the one hand, and the endless variations of their multiple
versions, on the other, constitute a particularly intense
moment in this crystallization.
Translated from the French by Jeanine Herman
fig. 14  Film und Foto exhibition, Berlin, 1929. Installation view of Soviet section.
Fotografische Sammlung, Kunstbibliothek Berlin
8Lugon
Appendix
F OTO G R A F I E D E R G E G E N WA R T
Essen (January 20–February 17)
Hannover (March 10–April 17)
Berlin (April 21–May 21)
London (June 6–29)
Frankfurt (July)
Leipzig (August 18–September 8)
Dresden (September 14–October 6)
Rostock (October 20–November 10)
Magdeburg (November 28–December 19)
Kaiserslautern (February–March)
Weimar (April 6–May 4)
Göttingen (May 18–June 8)
F I L M U N D F OTO
Stuttgart (May 18–July 7)
Zurich (August 28–September 22)
Berlin (October 19–November 17)
Danzig (dates unknown)
Vienna (February 20–March 31)
Zagreb (April 5–14)
Tokyo (April)
Osaka (July 1–7)
OT H E R E X H I B I T I O N S
Meisterwerk der Fotografie aus alter
und neuer Zeit (Masterpieces of historic
and contemporary photography),
Lübeck (April 14–May 15)
Das Lichtbild (Photography), Munich
(June 5–September 7)
Die neue Fotografie (The new photography),
Basel (January 11–February 8)
Fotomontage, Berlin (April 25–May 31)
Das Lichtbild Essen (Photography Essen)
(July 11–August 23)
1 9 2 9
January
February
March
April
May
June
July
August
September
October
November
December
1 9 3 0
January
February
March
April
May
June
July
August
September
October
November
December
1 9 3 1
January
February
March
April
May
June
July
August
September
October
November
December
Some of the most important traveling exhibitions of 1929–31, listed by date and
venue. Only documented venues are included. (Numerous others are mentioned
in the archives, but they are as yet unconfirmed.)
9Lugon
notes
The author wishes to thank
the many people who aided in
his research. At MoMA: Mitra
Abbaspour, Kelly Cannon, Lee
Ann Daffner, Maria Morris
Hambourg, and Hanako
Murata. In Germany: Florian
Ebner, Museum Folkwang Essen;
Christine Kühn, Kunstbibliothek
Berlin; Katharina Kuester-Heise,
Landesmuseum Württemberg;
Thomas Müller, Tamm;
Ulrich Pohlmann, Münchner
Stadtmuseum; Wolfgang Röver,
Folkwang Universität Essen;
Angela Schlegel, Archiv der
Hansestadt Lübeck; Sabine Schrag,
Stadtarchiv Stuttgart; Petra
Steinhardt, Museum Folkwang
Essen; and Angela Zieger,
Kunstakademie Stuttgart.
1. Olivier Lugon, “Photography
and Exhibition in Germany around
1930,” in Object:Photo. Modern
Photographs 1909–1949. The
Thomas Walther Collection at The
Museum of Modern Art (New
York: The Museum of Modern
Art, 2014).
2. German travel in 2013 included
Berlin, Essen, Lübeck, Munich,
Nuremberg, and Stuttgart. Prior
to this, I had studied collections
in Basel, Cologne, Los Angeles,
Magdeburg, and Zurich.
3. Ute Eskildsen and JanChristopher
Horak, eds., Film
und Foto der Zwanziger Jahre: Eine
Betrachtung der internationalen
Werkbundausstellung “Film und
Foto” 1929 (Stuttgart: Hatje, 1979),
p. 191.
4. The best reproduction of
the overall view can be
found in Württem­bergischen
Arbeitsgemeinschaft des
Deutschen Werkbunds, ed.,10
Jahre Werkbundarbeit in
Württemberg (Stuttgart: TagblattBuchdruckerei,
1930), p. 17.
For the left wall, see Casabella,
nos. 159–60 (1941): 33.
5. Schwäbisches Bilderblatt:
Wochenschrift zum Stuttgarter
neuen Tagblatt, no. 23 (June 7,
1929): [3]. Stadtarchiv Stuttgart.
The view of Room 1 reproduced
most often appears to be
just a tighter cropping of the
same negative.
6. Schwäbisches Bilderblatt:
Wochenschrift zum Stuttgarter
neuen Tagblatt, no. 22 (May 31,
1929): [8]. Stadtarchiv Stuttgart.
7. Internationale Ausstellung des
Deutschen Werkbunds Film und Foto
Stuttgart 1929 (Stuttgart: 1929).
Repr. ed. Karl Steinorth (Stuttgart:
Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt, 1979),
p. 48d.
8. In 1958 Arthur Ohler would
give his workshop, including his
photo archives, to Heinz Müller,
whose studio would in turn be
taken over by his son, Thomas
Müller. Today Thomas Müller is
a photographer at Tamm, not far
from Stuttgart, and takes care of
the remaining parts of the Ohler
collection. I thank him for the
research he has conducted in the
archives trying to locate views
of Fifo.
9. The photo archives of the
Stuttgarter neuen Tagblatt were
taken over by the Stuttgarter
Zeitung, today part of Südwestdeutsche
Medienholding.
10. See 10 Jahre Werkbundarbeit
in Württemberg, p. 18; and Die Form
5, no. 9 (May 1, 1930): 252. The
view primarily gives an idea of the
French contribution.
11. The following is a list of the
complementary volumes to
Film und Foto: Foto-Auge — Œil et
photo — Photo-Eye, ed. Franz Roh
and Jan Tschichold (Stuttgart:
Akademischer Verlag Fritz
Wedekind, 1929; repr. Tübingen:
Verlag Ernst Wasmuth, 1973);
Werner Gräff, Es kommt der neue
Fotograf! (Berlin: Verlag Hermann
Reckendorf, 1929; repr. Cologne:
Verlag Walther König, 1978);
Hans Richter, Filmgegner von
heute — Filmfreunde von morgen
(Berlin: Hermann Reckendorf,
1929; repr. Frankfurt: Fischer, 1981).
12. See Lugon, “Photography and
Exhibition in Germany around
1930,” in Object:Photo. See note 1.
13. The papers of Hans
Hildebrandt are at the Getty
Research Institute, Los Angeles;
Pankok’s papers can be found in
the Landesmuseum Württemberg,
Stuttgart; those of Schneidler are
in the Kunstakademie Stuttgart.
14. Heise’s correspondence is in
the collection of the Museum für
Kunst- und Kulturgeschichte in
Lübeck, Archiv der Hansestadt
Lübeck. Stenger’s archives are at
the Museum Ludwig de Cologne.
15. Giedion’s archives are in gta,
Institute for History and Theory
of Architecture, ETHZ, Swiss
Federal Institute of Technology
Zurich. On Giedion’s involvement
in Fifo, see Olivier Lugon,
“Neues Sehen, Neue Geschichte:
Laszlo Moholy-Nagy, Sigfried
Giedion und die Ausstellung
Film und Foto,” in Sigfried Giedion
und die Fotografie. Bildinszenierungen
der Moderne, ed. Werner Oechslin
and Gregor Harbusch (Zurich: gta
Verlag, 2010), pp. 88–105.
16. The papers of Franz Roh, active
on the committee of Das Lichtbild in
Munich (Getty Research Institute
and Deutsches Kunstarchiv im
Germanischen Nationalmuseum,
Nuremberg), remain surprisingly
silent on the topic.
17. See note 3. I should also point
out the work undertaken at the
same time by Karl Steinorth,
which resulted in a reprint of the
Stuttgart catalogue (Stuttgart:
Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt, 1979),
as well as the work by Beaumont
Newhall, whose important documentation
on the subject can be
found today in the Beaumont
and Nancy Newhall Papers, Special
Collections, Getty Research
Institute, Los Angeles.
18. Internationale Ausstellung des
Deutschen Werkbunds Film und
Foto Stuttgart 1929, repr. ed. Karl
Steinorth. See note 7.
19. The cardboard in back reveals
pinholes, which suggests it
might have been in a show without
the top cardboard, and that the
Fifo images may have been shown
two different ways during the tour.
Installation views in Berlin, in any
case, attest to dissimilar modes of
hanging, with the piercing of the
cardboards themselves rather than
external hooks. Given the problems
posed by the rapid deterioration of
images (see my essay in the book
Object:Photo, mentioned in note
1), reinforcement measures were
probably taken over the course of
the tour.
Citation:
Olivier Lugon. “Prints from the Thomas Walther Collection and German
Exhibitions around 1930.” In Mitra Abbaspour, Lee Ann Daffner, and
Maria Morris Hambourg, eds. Object:Photo. Modern Photographs: The
Thomas Walther Collection 1909–1949. An Online Project of The Museum
of Modern Art. New York: The Museum of Modern Art, 2014.
http://www.moma.org/interactives/objectphoto/assets/essays/Lugon.pdf.