William Eggleston
Greenwood, Mississippi

Greenwood, Mississippi

© Eggleston Artistic Trust, courtesy Eggleston Artistic Trust and David Zwirnerk

Greenwood, Mississippi
Greenwood, Mississippi
CultureAmerican
Titles
  • Greenwood, Mississippi
Date1973
Place depictedGreenwood, Mississippi, United States
MediumDye imbibition print
DimensionsImage: 11 7/8 × 18 3/8 in. (30.2 × 46.7 cm)
Sheet: 15 1/4 × 20 5/8 in. (38.7 × 52.4 cm)
Credit LineGift of Caroline Huber and Walter Hopps in honor of Anne Wilkes Tucker
Object number99.563
Not on view

Explore Further

Department
Photography
Object Type
Description

William Eggleston embraced color photography at a time when it was widely considered a commercial medium that was anathema to art, and he most often depicted the mundane details of daily life that were equally disdained in the world of art photography. Nonetheless, he captured the spirit of his native South in pictures with a bold command of color that paved the way for the medium’s acceptance. Eggleston was particularly devoted to the dye imbibition process (commonly called dye-transfer) for its clear and vivid rendition of color and its permanence relative to the more fugitive chromogenic prints typically used for color photography.


 


Of this picture, often called The Red Ceiling, Eggleston said, “When you look at the dye [transfer print] it is like red blood that’s wet on the wall. . . . A little red is usually enough, but to work with an entire red surface was a challenge.” If the saturated color is disquieting and the very thought of a glossy red room with a bare lightbulb seems a bit seedy, the touches of yellow and blue in the bottom right corner offer no relief: on close inspection they are revealed to be “how-to” diagrams.


ProvenanceThe artist; Walter Hopps and Caroline Huber; given to MFAH, 1999.
Exhibition History"Ruptures and Continuities: Photography Made after 1960 from the MFAH Collection," Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, Brown Foundation Galleries, February 21 - May 9, 2010.

“History of Photography I: Selections from the Museum's Collection,” The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, November 1, 2014–February 22, 2015.
Inscriptions, Signatures and Marks
No inscriptions
Unsigned
Stamped along right edge in blue "No.00257"

Cataloguing data may change with further research.

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