Morning Wash
Alexander Rodchenko Russian
Not on view
In 1935, after four years of being ostracized for his innovative graphic formalism, Rodchenko was reaccepted by his peers and included in the Moscow exhibition "Masters of Soviet Photography." This print of a child bathing--the artist's five-year-old daughter Varvara Alexandrovna--was selected as one of the twenty-four photographs by Rodchenko included in the show. Although the image did not overtly contribute to the betterment of Soviet life and thus fell short of the official party mandate, its compensation was its humanity defined both by the subject's physical vulnerability and by her comic gesture; the child mimics the artist's pose--hand camera held to the eye--as seen in the shadow cast on the floor.
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