Alfred Stieglitz: The Key Set - Volume I & II: The Alfred Stieglitz Collection of Photographs (Hardcover)

by Sarah et al. Greenough (Author)

Editorial Reviews

Review
"A must-have...it contains 'the finest print of every mounted photograph in Stieglitz's possession at the time of his death.'" -- Choice

Product Description
Few individuals have exerted as profound an influence on 20th-century American art and culture as Alfred Stieglitz (1864-1946). This luxurious two-volume boxed set is the definitive catalogue of the Alfred Stieglitz Collection of Photographs at the National Gallery of Art, Washington, the most complete Stieglitz holding in existence, donated to the gallery by his widow, artist Georgia O'Keeffe.

Numbering 1,642 photographs, the collection represents the full range of the master photographer's work-from early studies made in Europe, to views of the majestic New York skyline, to incomparable intimate portraits of O'Keeffe. Coinciding with a major traveling exhibition and providing complete scholarly apparatus and a chronology, this sumptuous volume demonstrates how Stieglitz absorbed the most advanced artistic concepts of his time into photography and transformed the medium forever.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 1100 pages
• Publisher: Harry N. Abrams; First Edition edition (August 1, 2002)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0810935333
• ISBN-13: 978-0810935334
• Product Dimensions: 16 x 11.7 x 5.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 19.4 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars See all reviews (7 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #421,754 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

20 of 22 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Outstanding set, fine quality reproductions, October 31, 2005

By	euterpe - See all my reviews

This is a major contribution to the field of artistic photography and art history, and frankly, I am not sure what the previous reviewer was looking at or for when giving this award-winning set one out of five stars (it was rated "outstanding art publication of the year" by the Art Libraries Society of North America in 2002).

Greenough's 2-volume set is a standout in numerous ways. For starters, it is the first retrospective work that has attempted to establish some kind of chronological order to Stieglitz's photographs (many of his major works were never dated previously). Why is this important? Stieglitz was extremely influential not only as an artist but as a technician, introducing new photo cropping and printing methods at a time when photography was just starting out as a field of study. Without dates for his photographs, it had previously been impossible to determine for certain whether Stieglitz was employing (or improving upon) techniques that were already out there, or if he was forging ahead into unknown territory.

The scholarship undertaken here is impressive: in addition to the dating of all the material, Greenough provides copious notes about the images, including invaluable information about the reproduction process. There is a detalied appendix, bibliography, index, and concordances, as well as information of other Stieglitz photographs in other collections.

Apart from the scholarship, however, what makes this set standout is the quality and quantity of the images. There are over 1600 photographs in this set, and only about a third of them had ever been reproduced before. Many of the images here are print variants that Stieglitz produced from the same negative, showing how he experimented with printing (using carbon, platinum, gelatin silver, and palladium among other materials) as well as cropping/orientating/mounting of his prints. These images give us a more complete picture Stieglitz's thought processes in terms of his art, his experimental nature, and the methods he employed in presenting his vision to the world.

5.0 out of 5 stars Beautiful and Comprehensive, May 18, 2009

By	Armando Yslas "ay" (New York) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This collection is a "must have" for anyone with an interest in Stieglitz. These massive books are beautifully printed and bound and enclosed in a bound case. The printing is excellent. This is a book for serious students of Stieglitz and of the processes that he employed to make his photographs. Anyone with an interest in alternate photographic techniques will appreciate the opportunity to view the same photographs printed via photogravure vs. platinum vs silver gelatin vs carbon. This boxed set is not your normal glossy-pretty-picture book (even though some of the photographs are enormously beautiful) but a compendium of the work done by a great master of Photography.

5.0 out of 5 stars A wonderful set, August 17, 2008

By	MFM008 "MFM008" (WA United States) - See all my reviews

Besides the fact this weighed more than my mom(a joke) I considered it
a great review of Steiglitz's work .Yes a number of pictures are not poster size but you still get the feel of the age, the man, and my favorite artist Georgia O Keeffe at a turning point in her life, I would highly recommend it.