Untitled

Artist Hans Bellmer (German, 1902–1975)

Date1936–1938

MediumGelatin silver print

DimensionsImage: 5 1/2 × 5 1/2 inches (14 × 14 cm);
Sheet: 6 1/4 × 5 7/8 inches (15.9 × 15 cm);
Mat: 14 × 11 inches (35.6 × 28 cm)

ClassificationsPhotographs

Credit LineAcquired through the Ernest I. White, Class of 1893, Endowment Fund

Terms

Photographs
Gelatin silver prints
Trees
Dolls

Object number87.024

Label CopyBellmer’s surrealist view of the human body is expressed in his life-size doll figures that he first made in 1933, the year Hitler came to power. Whether the photographs he made of his dolls are seen as responses to the rise of Nazism or interpreted in Freudian terms, they also explore his hatred of his father who became a Nazi and his own sexual fantasies. (“Highlights from the Collection: 45 Years at the Johnson," curated by Stephanie Wiles and presented at the Johnson Museum January 27–July 22, 2018)