The Dirigible Possibly 1910 - 1934

Alfred Stieglitz made this gelatin silver print, called "The Dirigible," at some unknown date. The tones are almost entirely grey, from light to very dark, and it’s hard to pick out exactly what’s going on. But I think that’s part of the point: photography, like painting, is a process of discovery and not just documentation. Look at the way the clouds are rendered, soft and blurry, almost like brushstrokes. There’s this tiny, almost comical blimp floating in the sky, a dark oval shape with some spindly bits hanging below. The sky dominates, swallowing the dirigible into the landscape. The textures of the clouds are so lovely, they make the entire image feel like an abstract painting. The bottom of the image features a line of trees in silhouette against the sky, reinforcing the painting-like aesthetic. Stieglitz’s photographs remind me a little of Gerhard Richter's blurry paintings, in the way that both artists are working with representation and abstraction simultaneously. Photography and painting are always in conversation, always pushing and pulling at each other, searching for new ways of seeing and experiencing the world.