Lot Essay
Roadside Stand near Birmingham is rich with so many of those essential visual qualities that most interested Walker Evans. The ample inclusion of signage and of the written word in this image is a shining example of Evans’ unique presentation of rural American society of this period. A cropped variant of the present image was included in the landmark one-person exhibition of Walker Evans' work American Photographs, presented by The Museum of Modern Art in 1938, as well as in the highly lauded accompanying book by Lincoln Kirstein.
In many of the images Evans made during his time working for the Farm Security Administration (FSA), he often juxtaposed words and figures in this manner. Here, in Roadside Stand near Birmingham, the viewer is confronted with a surplus of letters linked together, splayed across walls, signs and advertisements–some singing their message, some shouting, some carefully phrased. A painted fish, the contact information of an 'Old Reliable' house painter, and well-priced specials of the day together greet the viewer in a chorus of handwritten fonts. Taken out of the context of the day-to-day, they transform into a delightfully framed backdrop, inescapably flat in comparison to the strapping youth confronting the lens with squinting scrutiny.
In the exhibition catalogue for the retrospective held at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in 2000, Jeff Rosenheim suggests that this very image may have been the first taken by Evans during his trip to the American South with James Agee in 1936. Early images from this project documenting this region do indeed include heavy emphasis on roadside signage and storefronts along small-town main streets. The rest of the duo's trip, eventually centering on Hale County, Alabama, would ultimately lead to the images of the Burroughs and Tingle families and environs, subsequently included in the collaborative book by Agee and Evans Let Us Now Praise Famous Men, published first in 1939. (Portraits from that series can be found in Lots 23 and 119.)
The image in the present lot, originally from the collection of James Agee, is the only variant to ever appear at auction. This variant, with both boys in the foreground holding the melons up high, was the one selected for the American Photographs exhibition in 1938—and illustrated in the highly lauded accompanying book by Lincoln Kirstein-—which marked The Museum of Modern Art's first solo exhibition dedicated to a photographer. Furthermore, the print in this lot was selected and exhibited by the Metropolitan Museum of Art for the retrospective of the artist's work in 2000.
In many of the images Evans made during his time working for the Farm Security Administration (FSA), he often juxtaposed words and figures in this manner. Here, in Roadside Stand near Birmingham, the viewer is confronted with a surplus of letters linked together, splayed across walls, signs and advertisements–some singing their message, some shouting, some carefully phrased. A painted fish, the contact information of an 'Old Reliable' house painter, and well-priced specials of the day together greet the viewer in a chorus of handwritten fonts. Taken out of the context of the day-to-day, they transform into a delightfully framed backdrop, inescapably flat in comparison to the strapping youth confronting the lens with squinting scrutiny.
In the exhibition catalogue for the retrospective held at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in 2000, Jeff Rosenheim suggests that this very image may have been the first taken by Evans during his trip to the American South with James Agee in 1936. Early images from this project documenting this region do indeed include heavy emphasis on roadside signage and storefronts along small-town main streets. The rest of the duo's trip, eventually centering on Hale County, Alabama, would ultimately lead to the images of the Burroughs and Tingle families and environs, subsequently included in the collaborative book by Agee and Evans Let Us Now Praise Famous Men, published first in 1939. (Portraits from that series can be found in Lots 23 and 119.)
The image in the present lot, originally from the collection of James Agee, is the only variant to ever appear at auction. This variant, with both boys in the foreground holding the melons up high, was the one selected for the American Photographs exhibition in 1938—and illustrated in the highly lauded accompanying book by Lincoln Kirstein-—which marked The Museum of Modern Art's first solo exhibition dedicated to a photographer. Furthermore, the print in this lot was selected and exhibited by the Metropolitan Museum of Art for the retrospective of the artist's work in 2000.