Modern Photography

Beginning at the turn of the 20th century, modern photography offered a new approach to using a camera. Modern photographers embraced the camera’s mechanical and technological nature, producing images with sharp focus, an emphasis on formal qualities, and straightforward subject matter. “Photography, not soft gutless painting, is best equipped to bore into the spirit of today,” Edward Weston explained. This marked a profound stylistic shift—a rejection of the predominating pictorialist style of the late 19th century that was known for images with soft focus, artistic manipulations, and painterly qualities. In the auction market, record sales for modern photography include Edward Weston’s Nude (1925) for $1.6 million and Alfred Stieglitz’s …