The Steerage

Artist Alfred Stieglitz (1864 - 1946)

Date1907, printed before 1913

MediumPhotogravure

Dimensions13 1/8 x 10 1/2 in. (33.3 x 26.7 cm)
Framed: 20 3/4 x 16 3/4 x 1 1/8 in. (52.7 x 42.5 x 2.9 cm)

ClassificationsPrint

Credit LineAlfred Stieglitz Collection, Co-owned by Fisk University, Nashville, Tennessee, and Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art, Bentonville, Arkansas

Signedl.l., in margin, in pencil: The Steerage 1907 / Alfred Stieglitz

Accession number ASC.2012.85

DescriptionHand-printed, large-format photogravure

On View

Not on view

Collections

Alfred Stieglitz Collection

ProvenanceArtist; by bequest to Georgia O’Keeffe (Artist’s wife), New York, NY, 1946; to Fisk University, Nashville, TN, 1949; to Fisk University, Nashville, TN, and Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art, Bentonville, AR, as co-owners, 2012
Label TextOne of the most iconic images in the history of photography, The Steerage represents a shift in perception and way of seeing for the medium. Although Stieglitz was the leading advocate for Pictorialism—a trend in photography that favored soft focus, romanticized subjects, and artistic, manipulative printing practices—Stieglitz as an artist never fully practiced the methods in his own work. This image marked the official shift from his tendency toward a natural atmospheric haze, as seen in The Hand of Man, to a focus on elemental shapes, figures, highlights, shadow, and bisected visual planes. This early shift to Modernist seeing and thinking is what kept Stieglitz on the forefront of artistic trends.