Though his star had fallen until recently, William
Mortensen was a major force in American photography of the 1930s. His
background as a painter and photographer of Hollywood sets instilled in him a
romantic sensibility and a penchant for the theatrical and grotesque. Like
turn-of-the-century Pictorialists, he believed the original negative was a
starting point for personal expression that, through retouching, drawing, and
hand-coloring, could speak to universal issues. As Mortensen wrote the year
after creating this politically charged photograph, “getting the image onto the
negative is only taking the picture:
in printing, one comes to making the
picture.”

Mortensen exhibited and reproduced his images widely,
published a total of 12 books and many articles, and founded and ran the
Mortensen School of Photography in Laguna Beach, California, between 1932 and
1965. Despite his enormous success, his affection for painterly effects put him
at odds with many artists and critics who promoted “straight,” unmanipulated
photography.