Fighting Centaur 1952

This gelatin silver print, Fighting Centaur, was made by Frederick Sommer, who worked across photography, drawing, painting, and collage. It is an image of found objects cast in front of the camera, a theater of forms in monochrome. I like to think of Sommer cobbling these things together, layering meaning with odd juxtapositions. I wonder what he was thinking when he arranged these objects and took the picture. Perhaps he was interested in the way the photographic process could transform discarded fragments into a mythical creature. There is a kind of alchemy to the work. Photography can do this, it can change an idea through light and shade, making the ordinary look otherworldly. The process becomes an inquiry, a search for meaning, and the photograph allows for multiple interpretations, as if in an ongoing conversation with all other forms of image making.