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Paul Strand

Wall Street, New York, 1915, by Paul Strand

(American, 1890–1976)

Photographer and filmmaker Paul Strand is widely considered to be one of the leading American modernist artists. For over six decades of the twentieth century, he patiently produced portraits, abstractions, detailed renderings of natural and machine forms, and landscapes, among other favored subjects. Over time, he forged an incisive and wide-ranging chronicle of the modern world.

The Paul Strand Collection, comprising nearly 4,000 of Strand’s finest prints, is a cornerstone of the museum’s collection. These holdings include key images from across his entire career, extending from his early breakthrough trials in abstraction and candid street portraiture to his extended explorations of the American Southwest, Mexico, New England, France, Italy, Scotland, Egypt, Morocco, Ghana, and Romania.