Untitled (two women admiring baby) c. 1940

This gelatin silver print, Untitled (two women admiring baby), was made by Paul Gittings and is now at the Harvard Art Museums. This photograph is kind of like an inside-out painting, with the darks popping and the lights receding. I love the coziness of the scene – the women and the baby, the woven texture of the chairs, the plants. It’s a domestic world, but the light makes it feel dreamlike and a little unreal. I can imagine Gittings thinking about how to make such an ordinary scene strange and interesting, to push the boundaries of the medium. The details become so important, and the whole scene takes on this otherworldly quality because of it. What if Gittings was experimenting with new techniques, or just seeing what he could make the camera do? Thinking about the emotional resonance with the figures and their relationships, so close but rendered at a distance, reminds me of the painter Alice Neel. It's cool how different artists, with different tools, can wind up with these connections across time and space.