Ellen Koeniger, Lake George 1916

Alfred Stieglitz captured "Ellen Koeniger, Lake George" with his camera, and the resulting print is a lesson in monochromatic softness. It makes me wonder what Stieglitz was thinking as he composed the image. Was he concerned with the details of her flesh and the way light fell on her skin? Or was he considering the emotional weight of capturing a person’s essence? The photographic surface has this dreamy quality; the tones are subdued, the light evenly distributed. The woman's gaze is serene, as if she is contemplating the waters of the lake. I’m reminded of painters like Gerhard Richter, who explored the soft-focus effect in his figurative works. Artists are always building on and responding to one another's work. Stieglitz’s portrait of Ellen is a reminder of how artists play with the medium to evoke feeling, creating space for viewers to find their own stories within the frame.