Man Ray (Emmanuel Radnitzky)
Rayograph

Artist Man Ray (Emmanuel Radnitzky)(American, 1890–1976)American, 1890–1976

CultureAmerican

Titles

Rayograph

Date1927

MediumGelatin silver print, photogram

DimensionsImage: 11 15/16 × 9 15/16 in. (30.3 × 25.2 cm)
Sheet: 11 15/16 × 9 15/16 in. (30.3 × 25.2 cm)
Mount: 19 15/16 × 16 in. (50.6 × 40.6 cm)

Credit LineMuseum purchase funded by the Caroline Wiess Law Accessions Endowment, The Manfred Heiting Collection

Object number2002.1576

Non exposé

Explore Further

Department

Photography

Special Collections

Manfred Heiting Collection of Photography

Object Type

PHOTOGRAPHS

DescriptionMan Ray, László Moholy-Nagy, and Christian Schad are recognized as early and influential exponents of photograms as a means of extended expression among the 20th-century avant-garde. As would be expected from his affiliation with the Dada and Surrealist movements, Man Ray’s personal variant of the photogram, which he called the “rayograph,” was less restrained, more suggestive, and enigmatic in the seemingly arbitrary way in which he selected and organized objects.
ProvenanceAltmann, Paris, 1964; [Galerie Rudolf Kicken, Cologne]; purchased by Manfred Heiting; purchased by MFAH, 2002.
Exhibition History"Alias Man Ray," The Jewish Museum, New York, November 15, 2009–March 14, 2010.

"Utopia/ Dystopia: Construction and Destruction in Photography and Collage," Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, March 11–June 10, 2012.

"Man Ray's photography in the surrealist's Paris," Max Ernst Museum Brühl des LVR, Germany, September 15-December 8, 2013.

“Shadows on the Wall: Cameraless Photography from 1851 to Today,” The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, August 31–November 30, 2014.
Inscriptions, Signatures and Marks

Inscribed in blue ink, mount recto, top left: Collect. Altmann // Avril 1964 // 1000 –
Inscribed in pencil, mount verso, upper left: [illegible, erased]
Inscribed in pencil, mount verso, upper right: 10 [circled]
Inscribed in pencil, mount verso, upper center: 75
Inscribed in pencil, mount verso, center: 42 + [?]
Inscribed in pencil, mount verso, center: Original
Inscribed in blue ink, mount verso, lower left: D18-1324 6 [?]
Circular stamp in blue ink, mount verso, lower left corner: DOUANES // [illegible] // FRANÇAISES

Signed in pencil, recto, lower right: Man Ray 1927

Cataloguing data may change with further research.

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