Lunch Hour, San Francisco 1934

John Gutmann made this photograph, "Lunch Hour, San Francisco," and whatever chemicals, paper, and equipment he used have conspired to make something truly wonderful. The photograph depicts a crowd gathered in a narrow street, a car parked nearby, and figures scattered around, all caught in a moment of mid-day pause. There's a baseball game going on in the middle of the day! I love the way the light and shadow play across the surfaces, creating a high-contrast scene that's both gritty and strangely elegant. The texture of the street, the rough surfaces of the buildings, and the varied clothing of the figures all add depth and tactility to the image. It's like you can almost feel the cool shadows and the hard pavement. The hat is the dominant motif, they seem to swarm on the heads of the workers, who are mostly men. The entire scene is rendered in shades of gray, but within that limited palette, there's so much variation and nuance. Gutmann was part of a new vision that understood the street as a theater. Much like Lisette Model, his contemporary, he captured the rhythms of urban life with humor. He gives us a way of seeing the world that is both familiar and strange, grounded in the everyday, but elevated by the artist's unique vision.