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Lot Essay
The present lot possesses exceedingly rare provenance, coming directly from the family of Mr. and Mrs. Lester and Jean Roy Carter of San Francisco. The Carters were dear friends of Edward Weston’s and are mentioned throughout the artist’s published Daybooks. The Carter family have in their possession several fondly written letters from Weston to Jean Roy and Lester that reflect their close friendship. Likewise, this print has remained with the family since it was originally acquired from Weston in 1928, as evidenced by the artist’s inscription on the reverse of the mount.
Recounts of intimate, blithesome evenings of dancing and lively debate with Jean Roy and Lester, and even of playdates with Weston and their children, are found throughout the artist’s diaries. In a letter to Modotti in 1925, Weston wrote, ‘Neil goes to play every day at the Carter’s with their little girl, four; when he starts to leave she threatens with tears,’ (Edward Weston, The Daybooks of Edward Weston, Vol. I Mexico, Aperture, Millerton, 1973, p. 118). Later, on November 14, 1928, he wrote in his diary, ‘We danced!—tangos & danzóns...Jean Roy furnished a bottle of wine, to help along a good cause” (Weston, The Daybooks of Edward Weston, Vol. II California, Aperture, Millerton, 1973, p. 91).
Perhaps most telling of how truly loving their friendship was, is a letter written by Weston to Jean Roy on June 16, 1925, just after his departure from San Francisco, as he headed back for Mexico via Los Angeles. His letter to Jean Roy reads as follows:
Lovely-lovely Jean Roy—a thousand years from now I will remember our parting at the train—it was an exquisite— perfect gesture from you—I saw there on the platform all the way to Monterey—looking out upon the changing landscape— which I hardly saw—for my eyes were dimmed—This sounds like a love letter! And in truth it is! For I do love you and Lester and little Collier with deep tenderness—If I say that my leaving Mexico has been compensated for by finding you—please believe me—all your thoughtfulness towards me—and the fine times I have had with you shall be cherished memories no matter where I go.
During his sojourn in Mexico with Tina Modotti, Weston built on the foundations set by Stieglitz and his New York circle. Stieglitz’s mission was for fine art photography to depart from its previously dominant aesthetic of painterly Pictorialism, in favor of new modernist modalities for the medium. By the time Weston returned to California permanently at the end of 1926, his style, inspired and informed by Cubism, Dada and Mexican Social Realism, was emphatically modern, displaying a fondness for crisp lines, abstract forms and wide-ranging tonality.
Weston had begun photographing shells in March, 1927. His inspiration for the shell images was likely derived from a variety of sources. Weston biographer Amy Conger notes that toward the end of his stay in Mexico, the artist is likely to have seen oversized granite nautilus shell sculptures by the Aztecs. Another probable source was Canadian-born artist Henrietta Shore who, by 1927, had achieved critical acclaim with an exhibition at the San Diego Art Museum. Weston knew Shore, and took his first shell photographs in Shore’s studio in March of 1927. Within a few months, Weston wrote in his Daybook:
I was awakened to shells by the painting of Henry [Henrietta Shore]. I never saw a Chambered Nautilus before. If I had, my response would have been immediate! If I merely copy Henry’s expression, my work will not live. If I am stimulated and work with real ecstasy it will live. (Weston, The Daybooks of Edward Weston, Vol. II California, Aperture, Millerton, 1973, p. 21).
Weston took great pride in this early body of work, stating on March 20th of that year, 'The shells I photographed were so marvelous one could not do other than something of interest.'
The print in the present lot is on matte paper and unnumbered, as is consistent with Weston’s prints of the image made immediately after the 1927 negative date. It was in 1930, when Weston joined the f/64 photography group with Ansel Adams and Imogen Cunningham, that he began printing his images on a semi-gloss paper like his contemporaries; he also began numbering prints of this image for a projected edition of fifty. Thus, early prints of shells that are signed and on matte-surface paper are extremely rare; the artist’s dated inscription on the reverse of this print makes it even more so.
Recounts of intimate, blithesome evenings of dancing and lively debate with Jean Roy and Lester, and even of playdates with Weston and their children, are found throughout the artist’s diaries. In a letter to Modotti in 1925, Weston wrote, ‘Neil goes to play every day at the Carter’s with their little girl, four; when he starts to leave she threatens with tears,’ (Edward Weston, The Daybooks of Edward Weston, Vol. I Mexico, Aperture, Millerton, 1973, p. 118). Later, on November 14, 1928, he wrote in his diary, ‘We danced!—tangos & danzóns...Jean Roy furnished a bottle of wine, to help along a good cause” (Weston, The Daybooks of Edward Weston, Vol. II California, Aperture, Millerton, 1973, p. 91).
Perhaps most telling of how truly loving their friendship was, is a letter written by Weston to Jean Roy on June 16, 1925, just after his departure from San Francisco, as he headed back for Mexico via Los Angeles. His letter to Jean Roy reads as follows:
Lovely-lovely Jean Roy—a thousand years from now I will remember our parting at the train—it was an exquisite— perfect gesture from you—I saw there on the platform all the way to Monterey—looking out upon the changing landscape— which I hardly saw—for my eyes were dimmed—This sounds like a love letter! And in truth it is! For I do love you and Lester and little Collier with deep tenderness—If I say that my leaving Mexico has been compensated for by finding you—please believe me—all your thoughtfulness towards me—and the fine times I have had with you shall be cherished memories no matter where I go.
During his sojourn in Mexico with Tina Modotti, Weston built on the foundations set by Stieglitz and his New York circle. Stieglitz’s mission was for fine art photography to depart from its previously dominant aesthetic of painterly Pictorialism, in favor of new modernist modalities for the medium. By the time Weston returned to California permanently at the end of 1926, his style, inspired and informed by Cubism, Dada and Mexican Social Realism, was emphatically modern, displaying a fondness for crisp lines, abstract forms and wide-ranging tonality.
Weston had begun photographing shells in March, 1927. His inspiration for the shell images was likely derived from a variety of sources. Weston biographer Amy Conger notes that toward the end of his stay in Mexico, the artist is likely to have seen oversized granite nautilus shell sculptures by the Aztecs. Another probable source was Canadian-born artist Henrietta Shore who, by 1927, had achieved critical acclaim with an exhibition at the San Diego Art Museum. Weston knew Shore, and took his first shell photographs in Shore’s studio in March of 1927. Within a few months, Weston wrote in his Daybook:
I was awakened to shells by the painting of Henry [Henrietta Shore]. I never saw a Chambered Nautilus before. If I had, my response would have been immediate! If I merely copy Henry’s expression, my work will not live. If I am stimulated and work with real ecstasy it will live. (Weston, The Daybooks of Edward Weston, Vol. II California, Aperture, Millerton, 1973, p. 21).
Weston took great pride in this early body of work, stating on March 20th of that year, 'The shells I photographed were so marvelous one could not do other than something of interest.'
The print in the present lot is on matte paper and unnumbered, as is consistent with Weston’s prints of the image made immediately after the 1927 negative date. It was in 1930, when Weston joined the f/64 photography group with Ansel Adams and Imogen Cunningham, that he began printing his images on a semi-gloss paper like his contemporaries; he also began numbering prints of this image for a projected edition of fifty. Thus, early prints of shells that are signed and on matte-surface paper are extremely rare; the artist’s dated inscription on the reverse of this print makes it even more so.