"A Trepanning Operation on the Nation's Great Men in a Mountain Memorial"
S.L.A. Marshall
American, 1900–1977
1938
A gelatin silver print photograph that records the technical, scaffolded process of carving a colossal presidential face on Mount Rushmore, showing the photographer’s intent to reveal the machinery and labor behind a national monument.
Up close, the carved profile dominates the frame while ladders, ropes, wooden platforms, and rough granite crowd and dwarf the face, giving the scene a simultaneously monumental and precarious presence.
Taken for The New York Times in 1938, the image links photography, engineering, and nationalism by making visible how large-scale public memory is literally constructed and by shaping public perception of modern monumental projects.
Medium
Gelatin silver print
Dimensions
9 9/16 × 6 1/4" (24.3 × 15.8 cm)
Classification
Department
Credit
The New York Times Collection
Accession
2044.2001
Palette
Exhibitions
