iHirshhorn Museum and Sculpture GardenNational Mall
Light Is a Plastic Medium: The Photography of Carlotta Corpron
Six bodies of work made in Texas between the late 1930s and early 1950s by the abstract photographer and teacher Carlotta Corpron, drawn from a recent gift of 48 prints plus loans.
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In the late 1930s in Denton, Texas, Carlotta Corpron photographed flower arrangements with sunlight cut into stripes by Venetian blinds, and made the light the subject. She taught art history and design at a women's college, far from the art world, and worked in the darkroom until 1955.
The show follows six series she made in Texas, built on 48 prints given by collector Herbert Lust, Joe Hirshhorn's neighbor for 30 years. You start with those flower studies, move to Light Drawings, made by moving the camera past carnival lights at night, and end on Space Compositions, where reflections build space that isn't there. Mirrored trays and paperweights: the avant-garde, in this case, was built from things your grandmother dusts.
City Paper's Louis Jacobson found the early botanical studies fairly conventional and wrote that her works "get more interesting the more abstract they get." His verdict: her experiments are "worth a belated return to the spotlight." Admission is free and walk-up, through 14 March 2027.
Editor's pick
Six bodies of abstract photography the photographer and teacher Carlotta Corpron made in Texas from the late 1930s to the early 1950s, drawn from a recent gift of 48 prints.
Look for
Nature Studies
Look for floral arrangements striped by light coming through Venetian blinds, the series where Corpron first made light the subject.
Light Drawings
Swooping streaks of carnival lights, made at the Denton fairgrounds at night by moving the camera while the shutter was open.
White Paper Shapes (Cylinders and Rings), 1945
Paper curled into cylinders and rings, part of the Light Patterns series on how modulated light falls across paper and glass forms.
Space Compositions
Reflections and refractions off objects like mirrored trays build depth and space that exist only in the photograph.
The Havana church
A church in Havana drawn purely by the points of the string lights along its architecture.
Good for
- Cheap Culture
- Locals Who've Seen It All
- Nerding Out
- Rainy Days
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- Light Is a Plastic Medium: The Photography of Carlotta CorpronCourtesy of Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden
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- A Museum in the MakingAndrew Jameson / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 3.0
- Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture GardenGryffindor, via Wikimedia Commons, Public domain
- National Air and Space Museumajay_suresh via Wikimedia Commons, CC BY 4.0
- National Museum of Asian ArtDifference engine, via Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0
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- National Gallery of Artajay_suresh / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY 4.0