Owen Kanzler
Self Portrait

ArtistAmerican, born 1949
CultureAmerican
Titles
  • Self Portrait
Date1985
Place depictedSeaside Heights, New Jersey, United States
MediumChromogenic print
DimensionsImage: 15 15/16 × 15 13/16 in. (40.5 × 40.2 cm)
Sheet: 15 15/16 × 15 13/16 in. (40.5 × 40.2 cm)
Mount: 27 15/16 × 21 15/16 in. (71 × 55.7 cm)
Credit LineMuseum purchase funded by Photo Forum 2005
Object number2005.1463
Not on view

Explore Further

Department
Photography
Object Type
Description


The aerial photographer Owen Kanzler makes pictures midflight, photographing varied landscapes from the small aircraft he pilots. Taken from a dizzying height above the beach and boardwalk community of Seaside, New Jersey, Kanzler captures beachgoers with an incredible amount of detail. Kanzler’s bird’s-eye perspective flattens the beachgoers and their multi-color accoutrements into a kaleidoscopic dance of colors and patterns across the sandy surface of the beach. Kanzler playfully titled this photograph Self-Portrait, alluding to the shadow cast by his aircraft on the beach’s surface and his dual role as pilot and photographer.



Provenance[Afterimage Gallery, Dallas]; purchased by MFAH, 2005.
Exhibition History"Photo Forum 2005," Museum of Fine Arts, Houston; Lower Brown Corridor; October 3, 2005-January 9, 2006.
Inscriptions, Signatures and Marks
Marked in pencil on the mount, lower right below image: "O. Kanzler"
Stamp with pencil inscriptions on verso mount:
PHOTOGRAPH BY Owen Kanzler / TITLE Self Portrait / PLACE SEASIDE HEIGHTS, NEW JERSEY / DATE 1985 / NEGATIVE NUMBER JL 1785-c1416-60"

Printed stamp on verso center mount:: Photograph by / OWEN KANZLER / 606 Hagel Avenue / Linden, NJ 07036 / (908) 486-2262"

Cataloguing data may change with further research.

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