Helen Freeman

1921

Alfred Stieglitz

Artist, American, 1864 - 1946

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Artwork overview

  • Medium

    palladium print

  • Credit Line

    Alfred Stieglitz Collection

  • Dimensions

    image: 19.2 x 23.7 cm (7 9/16 x 9 5/16 in.)
    sheet: 19.9 x 25 cm (7 13/16 x 9 13/16 in.)
    mat: 58.42 × 48.9 cm (23 × 19 1/4 in.)

  • Accession

    1949.3.461

  • Stieglitz Estate Number

    81C

    Part of Stieglitz Key Set Online Edition

    Learn more
  • Key Set Number

    716

Alfred Stieglitz

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Discover over 1,000 artworks that the artist’s wife Georgia O’Keeffe termed his “Key Set” of prize photographs. Museum scholars have illuminated each work, his career, practices, and lifetime achievements.


Artwork history & notes

Provenance

Georgia O'Keeffe; gift to NGA, 1949.

Associated Names

Exhibition History

1958

  • Photographs by Alfred Stieglitz, National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC, March 16–April 27, 1958

1983

  • Photographs by Alfred Stieglitz, National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC, February 3–May 8, 1983; Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, June 17–August 14, 1983; The Art Institute of Chicago, October 18, 1983–January 3, 1984

2001

  • Modern Art and America: Alfred Stieglitz and His New York Galleries, National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC, 2001

2002

  • Alfred Stieglitz: Known and Unknown, National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC, June 2–September 2, 2002; The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, October 6, 2002–January 5, 2003

2010

  • Alfred Stieglitz: The Lake George Years, Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney, 2010

Bibliography

1958

  • Bry, Doris. Exhibition of Photographs by Alfred Stieglitz. Exh. cat. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1958: no. 75.

1983

  • Greenough, Sarah, and Juan Hamilton. Alfred Stieglitz: Photographs and Writings. Washington, 1983: no. 66.

2000

  • Modern Art and America: Alfred Stieglitz and His New York Galleries. Exh. cat. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 2001: no. 119.

2002

  • Greenough, Sarah. Alfred Stieglitz: The Key Set: The Alfred Stieglitz Collection of Photographs. Washington, 2002: vol. 1, cat. 716.

2010

  • Annear, Judy, ed. Alfred Stieglitz: The Lake George Years. Exh. cat. Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney, 2010.

Inscriptions

by Alfred Stieglitz, center verso, in graphite: R A
by Georgia O'Keeffe, on mount, lower left, in graphite: Treated by Steichen 1949
by later hand, center verso, in graphite: K / 81 C; on mount, lower left verso: 81 C

Wikidata ID

Q64034980

Scholarly Remarks and Key Set Data

Remarks

“I have been working away at the prints of you. Nearly daily something. I mount & rip off. One is most obstreperous.—I can’t make it do what I feel.—In about four weeks I may show at the Anderson Galleries.—I have a very unusual series of things.—A group of clouds to anchor my reality—anchor the ‘portraits’—I wonder would you mind my ‘showing’ some of you in case the event should materialize. I—we—wonder often about you. When I look at the hands I wonder what are they to-day?” (Stieglitz to Helen Freeman, 14 January 1923 [Sotheby’s, auction catalogue, 17 April 1991, lot 123A]).

For more information about this photograph, see Key Set number 711.

Stieglitz Collections

A corresponding print was given to the following institution(s) by Alfred Stieglitz during his lifetime, or was received or acquired from the estate:

Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, 24.1729 (inscribed: Hands—Helen Freeman / Photograph made by / Alfred Stieglitz / New York / Negative & print / made in New York / by Alfred Stieglitz / 1922 / Print 2 from this negative)

Other Collections

A print corresponding with this photograph can also be found in the following collection(s):

New York Public Library, Mitchell Kennerley Papers

Lifetime Exhibitions

A print from the same negative—perhaps a photograph from the Gallery’s collection—appeared in the following exhibition(s) during Alfred Stieglitz’s lifetime:

1923, New York (nos. 5–11, as Helen Freeman, 1922)
1930, Cambridge (no. 104, as Hands, Helen Freeman, 1922)


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