Back of Little House 1934

Alfred Stieglitz made this photogravure titled, "Back of Little House," sometime in his lifetime. Look at how the light plays with the textures, especially in the shingles. It's like each one is a slightly different shade, a slightly different mark, and together they make a kind of map. The photograph’s surface has a tactile quality. The blacks are deep and velvety, while the grays have a soft, almost hazy quality. The way the light catches the grain of the wood, the subtle variations in the shingles, the way the wind indicator points to the sky – all these details feel deliberate. Take for instance the detail of the broken blinds on the window, slightly ajar, creating a geometric pattern. It feels like a little painting in itself. I think of artists like Charles Sheeler or the Precisionists, who were also interested in finding abstraction in the everyday. But Stieglitz brings such a personal, intimate eye to it. It's like he's not just showing us a building, but a feeling.