A train engine is seen from the front with black steam coming from the engine. Train tracks fill the foreground and telephone poles and buildings are in the background. Number 1, January 1903 Photographs: six by Gertrude Käsebier; one by Alfred Stieglitz, Hand of Man; one by A. Radclyffe Dugmore. Paintings: one by D. W. Tryon; one by Pierre Puvis de Chavannes.Texts: by Alfred Stieglitz, Charles Caffin, Dallett Fuguet, John Barrett Kerfoot, Sidney Allan (Sadakichi Hartmann), Edward Steichen, Joseph Keiley, and others.
Expand
Close

Hand of Man, The

Stieglitz, Alfred

1903, January

Artwork Information

  • Title:

    Hand of Man, The

  • Artist:

    Stieglitz, Alfred

  • Artist Bio:

    American, 1864–1946

  • Date:

    1903, January

  • Medium:

    Photogravure

  • Dimensions:

    6 1/4 x 8 3/8 inches

  • Credit Line:

    Wichita Art Museum, Gift of Donna R. Bailey and Cornelia R. Yohr in memory of Grace Voss Ripley

  • Object Number:

    2007.29.13

  • Display:

    Not Currently on Display

About the Artwork

The technique of photogravure was invented in 1879 by Czech artist Karel Klic (1841–1926) and the process itself combines elements of photography and engraving. Sarah Greenough of the National Gallery, Washington, D.C. defines photogravure as “a method by which a photographic image formed in bichromate gelatin is used to control the etching of a metal plate for printing in ink.”

Alfred Stieglitz used photogravures for the art journal Camera Work, which explored the pictorial style of photography, a manner of expression, which emphasized the artistic rather than documentary aspects of a subject. In The Hand of Man a locomotive engine pulls into the Long island freight yard. This image has become an icon of 20th century photography that champions the exhilarating power of the machine.