Edward Steichen

Edward Steichen first embraced pictorialism because he believed photography could only claim equal status with painting if it looked painterly^*1. His early prints, especially The Flatiron, used layered printing processes to treat the photographic print itself as a site of artistic construction^*2. After World War I, however, his experience with aerial reconnaissance convinced him that precision and directness were photography's real strengths^*3. He abandoned his earlier pictorialist ambitions and became a major fashion photographer for Vogue and Vanity Fair before later taking over the photography department at MoMA. With The Family of Man in 1955, he helped establish photography as a museum medium with global public reach^*5.