A Life in Photography: Louise Rosskam and the Documentary Tradition
March 15–May 15, 2005
Kreps and Lyndhurst Galleries

Louise Rosskam (1910–2003) is one of the elusive pioneers of what some have called the golden age of documentary photography, whose strong work helped to shape the documentary aesthetic from the 1930s through the 1950s via its publication in widely circulated newspapers, magazines, and books. Working for more than three decades in collaboration with her husband, Edwin (1903–1985), she photographed for the Farm Security Administration, the Office of War Information, the Standard Oil Company of New Jersey, the Puerto Rico Office of Information, and the New Jersey Department of Education. Few of her images bear individual credit — she has explained that at the time the teamwork and the greater social purpose of the camera projects were always paramount. A Life in Photography is the first contextual exhibition to feature this gifted photographer’s contributions to the larger field of social reform photography.




Untitled (Children playing ball, school for children of seasonal and migrant workers, Cranbury, New Jersey), ca. 1967–68, Collection of Ani Rosskam and Susan Marchon


PUBLIC PROGRAMS

Film Screening
Tuesday, March 22, 7 p.m.
En Las Manos Del Hombre (The Hands of Man), 1952, Spanish dialogue, 36 minutes.

Produced by the Department of Education, Division of Community Education, Puerto Rico, and written and directed by Jack Delano, this documentary extols the important contribution that manual labor has played in Puerto Rico’s progress.

Louise Rosskam, along with her husband, Edwin, and friends Jack and Irene Delano, was deeply involved in documenting the dire social conditions of Puerto Rico in the 1940s and ’50s through photography, film, and graphics. They also helped to establish the Division of Community Education, which produced this film.


Public Reception and Curators’ Talk
Wednesday, March 30, 6–9 p.m.
Laura Katzman, Associate Professor of Art and Director of Museum Studies, Randolph-Macon Woman’s College; and Beverly W. Brannan, Curator of Photography, Library of Congress


Slide Lecture
Thursday, April 7, 7 p.m.
“Women of the FSA: Dorothea Lange, Marion Post Wolcott, Louise Rosskam, Marjory Collins, and Esther Bubley”
Beverly W. Brannan


Slide Lecture
Thursday, April 21, 7 p.m.
“Re-Viewing Documentary: The Photographs of Louise Rosskam”
Laura Katzman




Untitled (Children on row house steps, N Street, SW, Washington, D.C.), ca.1940–42, Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division


Additional support for this exhibition was provided by Michael D. Abrams, Washington, D.C., and Maier Museum of Art, Randolph-Macon Woman's College, Lynchburg, Virginia.







banner image:

Partial view of the Lyndhurst Gallery, one of four exhibition spaces at CDS. Photograph by Christoper Sims.


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