Adams, Lange, and Migrant Mother

VinceInMT · Nov 1, 2022

A few weeks ago I checked off a bucket list item and motorcycled south to visit the Heart Mountain Interpretive Center near Powell, Wyoming, the confinement site where 14,000 Japanese Americans where placed in the early 1940s. The subject has been one of interest and when I was doing some additional reading I came across references to Dorothea Lange and Ansel Adams work at a similar site, Manzanar. There was a discussion of that on Photrio here:

The Migrant Mother picture by Dorothea Lange

But that is not was I found surprising. Elsewhere, I read this article “How the Photography of Dorothea Lange and Ansel Adams Told the Story of Japanese American Internment” by Akiko Ichikawaon (available here) where she states that “Lange, also friends with Adams, encouraged him to take the job. (Coincidentally Adams printed “Migrant Mother” for her.)”

That he printed ”Migrant Mother” is drawn from the book “Moving Images: Photography and the Japanese American Incarceration” by Jasmine Alinder and this paragraph:

“The experience of printing such iconic photographs of the Depression such as “Migrant Mother” apparently installed in him an abiding respect for Lange’s work and also familiarized him thoroughly with the documentary genre.”

So the famous image, “Migrant Mother,” was shot by Lange but printed by Adams?

logan2z · Nov 1, 2022

A print of this just sold at last week's Swan Auction for $305,000 (hammer price of $250,000). The listing for the lot doesn't mention anything about it being printed by Ansel Adams - maybe there were some that were printed by Lange herself.

Alex Benjamin · Nov 1, 2022

You could write to The Library of Congress and ask.

Destitute pea pickers in California. Mother of seven children. Age thirty-two. Nipomo, California

1 negative : nitrate ; 4 x 5 in. | Photograph shows Florence Thompson with three of her children in a photograph known as "Migrant Mother." For background information, see "Dorothea Lange's M̀igrant Mother' photographs ..." http://www.loc.gov/rr/print/list/128_migm.html

www.loc.gov

DREW WILEY · Nov 1, 2022

She did her own printing. But it is possible AA printed a version of it for some venue like Family of Man. It's alleged to be the most famous photo ever taken by anyone. Last I heard, that woman is still alive, even though she looks old and haggard in that portrait (she was only in her 20's at the time). There are a couple of relatively recent PBS documentaries about Dorothea which talk about it. I used to chat with Dorothea's nephew a couple times a week; and her assistant during those Dust Bowl era shoots, Rondal Partridge, lived with him and his wife until his death in his mid-90's. Rondal was also once one of AA's assistants. I have been to Dorothea's house when her second husband was still alive, but relative to a restoration project, not any photo topic.

A reprint of some second or third generation Super-XX duplicate neg from the Library of Congress wouldn't be worth anything. I myself have been paid to make big enhanced prints from a few of those, prior to the digital restoration era. Most of her original work is housed in the photo archives of the Oakland Museum.

Alex Benjamin · Nov 1, 2022

Adams devotes almost a whole chapter to Lange in his Autobiography. He admired her a lot, they did joint assignments, even though their different temperaments caused frictions. Nowhere does he mention printing "Migrant Mother." He probably would have had he done so.

Here are a couple of excerpts:

"In 1935 President Roosevelt established the Resettlement Administration, to aid the thousands of farmworkers unemployed because of the great quantities of land that had become a dust bowl, unable to produce crops. Within this organization was the FSA, led by Roy Stryker, which assembled photographers to record American rural life. Dorothea was, in my opinion, the superior artist in that group. Her great photograph, Migrant Mother, Nipomo, California, 1938, is as compelling aesthetically as it is as a document. My associations with Dorothea were both rewarding and perplexing. No one could dispute her gifts and her extraordinary energy. Her political/social views were quite definite, yet discreetly restrained in her professional and public contacts. I recall many discussions among our close friends and colleagues as to whether she leaned to Leninism or Trotskyism and whether she was a Communist Party member or not. She implied her sympathies in her work, but usually did not make obvious images or pronouncements along any party line. There was great integrity in her beliefs and opinions, and great skepticism about the complacent society around her and the avowed “Good Old Boy” attitudes of industry as well as the general machinations of politics..."

"...In spite of the occasional difficulties I had while working with her, I wish to affirm Dorothea’s extraordinary qualities as a photographer. I learned much from her devotion to the art and the severe application of discipline and effort in everything she did. I used one of her photographs, White Angel, Bread Line, San Francisco, in Making a Photograph as an example of powerful creative photography applied to a social situation. Dorothea and I had a lively correspondence, freely expressing our philosophical disagreements about photography and life in general."

Paul Howell · Nov 1, 2022

At the time of Migrant Mother Lange was employed by the Resettlement Administration, a Federal New Deal agency, all of the photo and negatives she took while working for the Federal Government are the property of the government, the Library of Congress houses her negatives and final prints. Her work with the Japanese American who were interned during WWII was under the War Relocation Authority, she gave up an Guggenheim Fellowship to work for the War Relocation Authority. In terms of AA printing Migrant mother, I would like see additional documentation, Lange was very good darkroom worker and I don't know why she would have AA print for her. Unlike Lange Adams during the depression was awarded grants, the majority of his negatives were his property, I know that the Dept. of the Interior has some of his negatives, but not his best work, while Lange was a federal employee.

Alex Benjamin · Nov 1, 2022

DREW WILEY said:
Last I heard, that woman is still alive,

She died of cancer in 1983.

DREW WILEY · Nov 1, 2022

Wow. That potentially indicates what a length of time went into that documentary before it was complete. Or maybe nobody had used the interview footage before, and dug it up archived somewhere. The same thing happened with my own father. My mouth dropped three years ago when a PBS documentary was showing footage of him I didn't even know existed, taken the year I was born.

But in fairness, I have heard more than once that the '83 death involved a mis-identification, and was not the same woman at all, and just a coincidence of names. Someone might want to sleuth that further, or might already know the correct version.

As far as who owned her negs, they were mainly with herself the whole time. Her second husband was directly connected to the Fed agency in charge. But again, someone else might have much more specific info than me. The Manzanar project was different because it was under military jurisdiction; but she apparently bootlegged a number of shots, taking unauthorized ones for her own use, so wasn't welcomed back.
In this neighborhood there is still a lingering dread of her ghost; she could be quite an unwelcome persistent stalker of her subjects, yet could also be remarkably patient and tactful when dealing with Depression era migrants and farm workers. Certainly a complex individual.

Paul Howell · Nov 1, 2022

Florence Thompson the woman in Migrant Mother was interviewed by PBS in the late 70s or early 80s, she was bitter that she never got a royalty for the photography. Additional research, (minimal at that) according to the fount of all knowledge Wikipedia. the

"In the late 1960s, Bill Hendrie found the original Migrant Mother photograph along with 31 other unretouched, vintage photos by Dorothea Lange in a dumpster at the San Jose Chamber of Commerce.[16] After the death of Hendrie and his wife, their daughter, Marian Tankersley, rediscovered the photos while emptying her parents' San Jose home.[16] In October 2005, an anonymous buyer paid $296,000 at Sotheby's for the 32 rediscovered Lange photos—nearly six times their pre-bid estimate.[16]:"

Not sure who they know it was the original, appears that all of her negatives taken while working for various government agency are at the Library of Congress, again not sure, if I get time might check the online LOC data base.

Alex Benjamin · Nov 1, 2022

DREW WILEY said:
Someone might want to sleuth that further, or might already know the correct version.

No sleuthing necessary: https://www.history.com/news/migrant-mother-new-deal-great-depression

Alex Benjamin · Nov 1, 2022

To get back to the OP, as Paul mentioned, the negatives were sent to the FSA. This particular neg was retouched at the agency to erase a thumb on a pole. An original print exists and belongs to the Library of Congress (see lower right corner).

Since that original neg was retouched at the FSA, hard to see how and when Ansel Adams could have had it in his hand for printing.

without the thumb:

DREW WILEY · Nov 1, 2022

Well, Alex, the History Channel is hardly what I'd call an authoritative source. Aren't they the ones with the Bigfoot documentaries, and other such cable TV nonsense? They might or might not be correct; but there must be someone around who has the facts from a way better source than that half-baked entertainment venue! Just referring to some loosey-goosey web link like that hardly constitutes real homework. But it is symptomatic of the web era; everyone expects everything at a mere mouse click. And please don't follow up with Wikipedia. If it were of any real academic interest to me, I'd simply go to the museum or the family. But my interactions have been infrequent since retirement. Got my own things to do. Still, it's all so compelling, historically, that it's hard to ignore. I had an aunt of my own employed as an artist by the Fed during that era.

No telling what happened to the original neg once duplicates were made. But there again, I'd want to ask a specialist, not Bigfoot.

faberryman · Nov 1, 2022

So Ansel Adams printed Dorthea Lange's Migrant Mother. Is there anything he didn't do? Was he the printer Henri Cartier-Bresson engaged to process and print his work? Did he shoot it too?

Alex Benjamin · Nov 1, 2022

DREW WILEY said:
Well, Alex, the History Channel is hardly what I'd call an authoritative source.

Granted.

Obit from the New York Times: https://www.nytimes.com/1983/09/17/obituaries/symbol-of-depression-dies-at-the-age-of-79.html

Her Wiki page states that she died in 1983. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Florence_Owens_Thompson

She would be 119 today, should she still be alive.

DREW WILEY · Nov 1, 2022

Well, I already caught my own miscalculation while spotting prints this afternoon, thinking about how old she would be now. I have a habit of thinking something I saw or did twenty years ago was just a few years back. Or maybe I was born senile. Although I did see that particular PBS documentary not long ago, like many things, it gets re-aired from time to time, and I myself have seen it multiple times, but forgot when the first time was. There were two excellent PBS documentaries on her, and they went to a lot of trouble to interview at length local family members, and even had footage up at her house when she was still alive, sorting through her sample prints right beside John Szarkowski there, for sake of a retrospective. That same tremendous live oak tree visible in some of her picture is still there. I forgot the address.

I really admire Lange's work because it is so NOT me ... I could never get in someones face like that, but she did, and came out with sheer poetry and pathos over and over again. Plus that pivotal time in US history. She also made a lot of enemies, even within her own family for awhile.

As per her alleged politics, I take it all with a grain of salt. There was even talk of destroying all my aunt's murals, and those of all the other commissioned WPA muralists, because the preferred style of that era was in fact Social Realism, which certain fanatics wishing to undo Roosevelt's heritage managed to habitually contort into meaning, "Socialist Realism". That particular iconoclastic urge to destroy public art has come and gone, but even nuttier things have arrived to take its place. Same thing happened from time to time in ancient Egypt and Assyria. Some things are predictable.

Alex Benjamin · Nov 1, 2022

faberryman said:
So Ansel Adams printed Dorthea Lange's Migrant Mother. Is there anything he didn't do? Was he the printer Henri Cartier-Bresson engaged to process and print his work? Did he shoot it too?

I think Ansel shot The Decisive Mountain.

ic-racer · Nov 1, 2022

gone · Nov 1, 2022

I never heard the particulars on that image, guess all I care about are the images. Dorothea Lange was a master photographer/artist, and her work is outstanding.

Women had a tough time getting photography gigs back then. In my mind, they had to be better than the men to have any chance at getting any commercial work or a gallery show. This is certainly reflected in her photos, as very, very few people come up to her standard.

DREW WILEY · Nov 2, 2022

Many of those Federal Depression era commissions went to women. My own aunt got more fresco mural commissions than any other person in US history, and she never socialized with the haute art set of that era. Had nothing to do with gallery gigs. They were paid very little, yet fame and museum representation was indeed a result down the line for many of them. But there were other issues, including cases of plagiarism. A lot got forgotten for several decades, but is attracting wide attention anew. That single photo by Lange has been published in some many countries as an icon of poverty that it pretty much kept her in the spotlight all along. But she took many more great images too.

jtk · Nov 3, 2022

Lange visited on her Berkeley deck with Harvey Halvorsen a dear friend and fine artist who had been making his living with children's school photos. He brought his Kodak view camera in a case....along with examples of his high volume work. She told him how beautiful and important those simple kiddie photos were. That inspired a total change in his photo career.

Adams, Lange, and Migrant Mother

The Migrant Mother picture by Dorothea Lange​

Privacy & Transparency

Privacy & Transparency

The Migrant Mother picture by Dorothea Lange