Gertrude Kasebier: The Photographer and Her Photographs [Hardcover]

Barbara L. Michaels (Author), Gertrude Kasebier (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: May 1992

This is the first book about the pioneering photographer Gertrude Kasebier (1852-1934). In middle age, with three grown children, she began to study painting and photography, set up a portrait studio on New York's Fifth Avenue, and became one of the finest and best-known portraitists and photographic artists of her day. 116 illustrations.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Best remembered for her soft-focus studies of mothers and children, Gertrude Kasebier (1852-1934) was hailed by fellow photo-secessionist Alfred Stieglitz as the leading portraitist of her day. Yet she was categorized as a "woman photographer," and after she broke with Stieglitz in 1912 her reputation waned. This splendid biographical-critical study, which accompanies an exhibition at New York's Museum of Modern Art, profiles Kasebier's art in its diversity, from expressive portraits of Sioux Indians to a symbolist-influenced female nude ( The Bat ). Unhappily married to a wealthy German businessman, Kasebier in one photograph likened matrimony to the muzzling of cattle. In addition to strong portraits of Mark Twain, Jacob Riis, Booker T. Washington, Robert Henri and Auguste Rodin, she shot baffling parables and hand-crafted impressionistic since she's not member or Impressionist school scenes, all perceptively interpreted here by Michaels, guest curator of the exhibit.
Copyright 1992 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Library Journal

The extraordinary Kasebier (1852-1934) calmy defied the social conventions of her day to set up her own studio at 36, soon becoming a prominent figure in early 20th-century photography. Her well-known works include photographs of mothers and children ("The Manger" and "Blessed Art Thou Among Women") plus a group of portraits whose trademark style offers an uncompromising likeness and reveals the personality of the sitter. But Kasebier's personal and professional estrangement from Alfred Stieglitz and the photo-secessionists eventually took her out of the field's mainstream and into semi-obscurity. Michaels, guest curator of the current Museum of Modern Art retrospective featuring Kasebier's works, has written an expert, sympathetic, and much-deserved critical biography of a pioneer who helped elevate the photographic portrait to the status of an art form. Recommended for photography collections.
- Jacqueline Adams, Carroll Cty. P.L., Westminster, Md.
Copyright 1992 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 192 pages
• Publisher: Harry N Abrams; 1St Edition edition (May 1992)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0810935058
• ISBN-13: 978-0810935051
• Product Dimensions: 6.6 x 4 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 6.4 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #890,510 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

11 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Painterly Photographic Masterpieces, November 20, 2001

By 

Antonia Bauerlein Sehnert (California, United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Gertrude Kasebier: The Photographer and Her Photographs (Hardcover)

Kasebier's work is a "must have" resource for artists and photographers alike. The print quality of the book is first-rate. It is written in a rather collegiate fashion -- lots of detail -- but a very pleasureable read nonetheless. One could mistake some of Kasebier's works as paintings, and the many large format prints contained in this volume make for hours of entranced consumption of its pages. As an artist and photographer I've been collecting books for 30 years. This ranks way up there on my list of favorites.