When Stieglitz sent this print to Georgia O'Keeffe at Christmas in 1939, he did not need to remind her of the moment of its making. The couple, not yet married, were together at the farm at Lake George, New York. The upward peak of the gable and the tantalizingly incumbent apples joined the symbolic national fruit with Stieglitz's sexuality and his search for an American art. Upon seeing the photograph, the poet Hart Crane exclaimed to Stieglitz, "That is it, you have captured life."
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Artwork Details
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Title:Gable and Apples
Artist:Alfred Stieglitz (American, Hoboken, New Jersey 1864–1946 New York)
Date:1922
Medium:Gelatin silver print
Dimensions:11.4 x 9.0 cm (4 1/2 x 3 9/16 in.)
Classification:Photographs
Credit Line:Ford Motor Company Collection, Gift of Ford Motor Company and John C. Waddell, 1987
Accession Number:1987.1100.103
Inscription: Signed and inscribed on 2nd mount, verso LR: "For Georgia [underlined] // Alfred. // Xmas/39"; inscribed on 2nd mount, verso LC: "Lake George // 1920 [underlined]";
Georgia O'Keeffe; Juan Hamilton via Robert Miller Gallery to Waddell, November 27, 1985
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.
The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "Stieglitz, Steichen, Strand," November 8, 2010–April 10, 2011.
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.
Norman, Dorothy. Alfred Stieglitz: An American Seer. New York: Random House, 1973. p. 177, pl. XLVII.
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. 115.
Greenough, Sarah. Alfred Stieglitz: The Key Set. Vol. 2. Washington, D.C.: National Gallery of Art, Washington D.C., 2002. no. 777.
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. 84, pp. 141, 243.
Orenstein, Nadine M., Jeff L. Rosenheim, and Stephen C. Pinson. The Metropolitan Museum of Art Bulletin: A Centennial Album: Drawings, Prints, and Photographs 74, no. 3 (Winter 2017). p. 34.
Alfred Stieglitz (American, Hoboken, New Jersey 1864–1946 New York)
1932
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