Sign, Saratoga Springs
Ralph Steiner
American, 1899–1986
1929
A gelatin silver print photograph in which Ralph Steiner isolates a roadside NEHI advertisement on a clapboard building to turn a common commercial sign into a precise study of form, texture, and composition.
You are struck by the oversized NEHI letters and the painted pair of legs jutting from the billboard, their graphic boldness set against the pale, horizontally striated clapboards and an otherwise empty façade.
Made in 1929, the image exemplifies modernist photography’s turn to everyday urban and commercial details—using vernacular signage to explore abstraction, composition, and the visual presence of mass culture in American life.
Medium
Gelatin silver print
Dimensions
9 1/2 × 7 1/2" (24.1 × 19.0 cm)
Classification
Department
Credit
Gift of the artist
Accession
645.1970
Palette
Art Terms
Exhibitions
