Towards the end of her life Dorothea Lange (American 1895-1965) remarked that all
photographs-not only those that are so-called 'documentary ' and every photograph really is
documentary and belongs in some place has a place in history-can be fortified by words. Though
Lange's career is widely heralded this connection between words and pictures has received
scant attention. Published in conjunction with an exhibition at The Museum of Modern Art this
catalogue provides a fresh approach to some of her best-known and beloved photographs
highlighting the ways in which these images first circulated in magazines government reports
books etc.An introductory text by curator Sarah Hermanson Meister will be followed by plates
organized according to words from a variety of sources that expand our understanding of the
photographs. The featured photographs will range from Lange's first engagement with documentary
photography in San Francisco in the early-mid 1930s including her iconic White Angel Breadline
(1933) to landmark photographs she made for the Resettlement Administration (later the Farm
Security Administration) such as Migrant Mother (1936) powerful photographs made during World
War II in California's internment camps for Japanese-Americans major photo-essays published in
Life magazine on Mormon communities in Utah (in 1954) and County Clare Ireland (in 1955) and
quietly damning photographs made in the Berryessa Valley in 1956-57 before the region was
flooded by the construction of a dam intended to address California's chronic water
shortages.Exhibition opens December 2019.
