5 Cent Sign, Demopolis, Alabama
1976
North America, United States
William Christenberry
(Tuscaloosa, Alabama, 1936 - 2016)
20th century CE
Vintage chromogenic color print, 3 1/2 x 5 in. (8.9 x 12.7 cm)
Museum purchase with support from The Joseph and Robert Cornell Memorial Foundation, American Art Deaccession Fund, Acquisition Fund, and The John and Margaret D. Barber Fund
, 2010.1.1
© William Christenberry
Object Type:
Photograph
Label or Catalogue entry
William Christenberry was born in Tuscaloosa, Alabama and received a degree in painting from the University of Alabama in 1959. A meeting with the photographer Walker Evans inspired Christenberry to begin photographing his regional home of Hale County (Evans had photographed Hale County in the 1940s when he worked with James Agee on the book Let Us Now Praise Famous Men). Whether using photography, painting, drawing or sculpture, Christenberry’s interest in the themes and traditions of the rural American South translate into a simple yet monumental iconography. On both formal and conceptual levels, his work focuses on the prolonged study of a place. This series of images, made with an antique Brownie camera, began in the 1960s. It documents the essence of the region’s heritage and also presents meditations upon the universal experience of stasis and change.
Southern Views, Southern Photographers: January 14-June 5 extended to June 12, 2011
Additional Images
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Exhibition List
This object was included in the following exhibitions: