"Here the movement of 1/100th of a second is frozen with a truthfulness to life which neither brush nor pencil could ever surpass," wrote Renger-Patzch of this image in New Camera Views. The next year (1928) he composed a picture book, The World is Beautiful, which treats man-made and natural objects as structural analogues of one another. This organizing principle rejected the visual delight of the atypical or anomalous, so vivid in this picture; consequently the book reproduced a static and conventional "portrait" of the baboon instead of this image.
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Inscription: Stamped on print, verso UL: "Phot. A. Renger-Patzsch // BAD-HARZBURG"; stamped on print, verso UC: "Jede Reproduktion // verboten"; inscribed on print, verso C: "Göhnender Pavian"; inscribed on print, verso UC: "J129"; inscribed on print, verso LL: "Heise"; inscribed on print, verso LR: "6";
(Sale, Phillips, New York, Photographs from the 1920s and 1930s, November 13, 1980, Lot #20); John C. Waddell
The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "The New Vision: Photography between the World Wars. The Ford Motor Company Collection at The Metropolitan Museum of Art," September 23–December 31, 1989.
San Francisco Museum of Modern Art. "The New Vision: Photography between the World Wars. The Ford Motor Company Collection at The Metropolitan Museum of Art," February 28–April 22, 1990.
Los Angeles County Museum of Art. "The New Vision: Photography between the World Wars. The Ford Motor Company Collection at The Metropolitan Museum of Art," May 10–July 15, 1990.
High Museum of Art. "The New Vision: Photography between the World Wars. The Ford Motor Company Collection at The Metropolitan Museum of Art," February 5–April 28, 1991.
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. "The New Vision: Photography between the World Wars. The Ford Motor Company Collection at The Metropolitan Museum of Art," June 8–August 4, 1991.
IVAM, Centre Julio Gonzalez, Valencia. "The New Vision, IVAM, Centre Julio Gonzalez, Valencia," January 20, 1995–March 26, 1995.
Tokyo Metropolitan Art Museum. "Earth, Sea, and Sky: Nature in Western Art—Masterpieces from The Metropolitan Museum of Art," October 6, 2012–January 4, 2013.
Beijing. National Museum of China. "Earth, Sea, and Sky: Nature in Western Art—Masterpieces from The Metropolitan Museum of Art," February 8–May 9, 2013.
Hambourg, Maria Morris. The New Vision: Photography between the World Wars, Ford Motor Company Collection at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1989. no. 75.
Barnet, Peter, and Atsuyuki Nakahara. Earth, Sea, and Sky: Nature in Western Art: Masterpieces from The Metropolitan Museum of Art. Tokyo: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2012. no. 86, pp. 143, 244.
Albert Renger-Patzsch (German, Wurzburg 1897–1966 Wamel)
ca. 1929
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