Betty Parsons

Artist Richard Pousette-Dart American, 1916–1992

Date1948

MediumGelatin silver print

Dimensionsheight and width: 13 1/4 × 10 1/4 in. (33.7 × 26 cm)
frame: 22 3/8 × 16 3/8 × 1 1/2 in. (56.8 × 41.6 × 3.8 cm)

ClassificationsPhotography

Credit LineGift of the Richard Pousette-Dart Foundation

Object number2023.17.1

On View

Not on view

Label TextThough Pousette-Dart is recognized for his abstract paintings, his photographs exhibit a similar technical skill and a fascination with light that drove him as a painter. His interest in taking pictures stemmed from a curiosity for machines. His father worked in New York City’s advertising and fine art circles, which offered the younger Pousette-Dart a chance to meet modern photographers like Berenice Abbott and Alfred Stieglitz.

Pousette-Dart joined the Betty Parsons Gallery in 1948 and was given three solo exhibitions that year. One featured several photographs, and likely included this portrait. The picture is from a series in which Pousette-Dart merged images of sitters with objects that speak to their identity. Here , Parsons’s downward face is overlaid by what appears to be one of her drawings.

-Jared Ledesma, Curator of 20th-Century and Contemporary Art, "Betty Parsons: Art Pioneer," 2023
ProvenanceCreated by the artist, 1946; Richard Pousette-Dart Estate; The Richard Pousette-Dart Foundation; given to NCMA, 2023.Published ReferencesCharles Hagen, “Photography Review: An Abstractionist on Canvas, a Fantasist on Film,” The New York Times, March 22, 1996 (incorrectly notes: “Parsons appears in front of a close-up of a drawing, presumably one of Pousette-Dart’s”).

“Richard Pousette-Dart,” Aperture 145, no. 4 (Fall 1996), p. 52–59. (variant)

Jennifer Powell, Lowery Stokes Sims, Charles H. Duncan, Lucy Kent and Patti Trimble, "Richard Pousette-Dart: Beginnings," Cambridge: Kettle’s Yard, University of Cambridge, 2018. p. 105. (exhibition catalogue)Exhibition HistoryNew York, Zabriskie Gallery, "Richard Pousette-Dart: Photographs," March 6–April 13, 1996.

Cambridge, UK, Kettle’s Yard, University of Cambridge, "Richard Pousette-Dart: Beginnings," October 23, 2018–January 6, 2019.

Raleigh, NC, North Carolina Museum of Art, "Betty Parsons," November 3, 2023–November 4, 2024. Object Rights Statement

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