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Wendi Schneider

Wendi Schneider

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Wendi Schneider is a collector of art and objects primarily from the turn of the 20th century, including Art Nouveau, Arts & Crafts, photogravures, and silver, platinum and gum prints. She began collecting old things as a child antiquing with her mother and collecting in earnest once she had her own place in New Orleans in the late 1970s.

The collection below is pulled from The_Schneider_Collection Instagram page, which was begun in 2019, currently featuring photography and books. The collection also includes china, pottery, textiles, prints, boxes, glass, lighting, furniture and frames – some of which house photographs from her collection and others which are paired with her own work in the Patina Collection.

From the series, The Window of My Studio, 1940 — From the series, The Window of My Studio, 1940 — 1954, a 1970s silver print by Josef Sudek. Image 7 x 5 inches (17.8x12.7 cm.), the sheet 9 x 7 inches (23.2x17.8 cm.), with Sudek's signature in pencil on recto.

“In 1940, Josef Sudek began his best-known series of photographs, a body of images of or through his studio window in Prague, Czechoslovakia. The forty-four year old veteran of World War I, in which an injury to his arm resulted in its amputation, concentrated on this subject for fourteen years, highlighting the variety and range of expression that can be achieved with a slim part of the world that is close at hand. It is no accident that the series coincided with the German occupation of Prague, World War II, and the subsequent Communist regime. For Sudek, who grew increasingly reclusive over the decades, his studio, the window, and the small garden beyond became an important sanctuary, and a way to express his own tentative relationship with the external world. Sometimes perfectly transparent, sometimes coated with frost or water droplets, the glass window both frames the outside world and serves as a barrier from it.”

— Russell Lord, Freeman Family Curator of Photographs, Prints, and Drawings, New Orleans Museum of Art

#thewindowofmystudio #josefsudek #fineartphotography #russelllord #theschneidercollection #throughthewindow #vintagephotography #treethroughthewindow #vintageprague #vintagepraguephoto
Still Life. Platinum or related metal print by Dor Still Life. Platinum or related metal print by Doris Ulmann, c. 1920s. 8x6¼ inches (20.3x15.8 cm.).

From the Collection of John Jacob Niles, Ulmann's former assistant and companion

Doris Ulmann (May 29, 1882 – August 28, 1934) was an American photographer, best known for her portraits of the people of Appalachia. Her interest in photography was at first a hobby but after 1918 she devoted herself to the art professionally. She practiced Pictorialism and was a member of the Pictorial Photographers of America. Ulmann documented the rural people of the South, particularly the mountain peoples of Appalachia and the Gullahs of the Sea Islands, with a profound respect for her sitters and an ethnographer's eye for culture. Ulmann was trained as a pictorialist and graduated from the Clarence H. White School of Modern Photography.

She is perhaps best known for her photogravure portraits in her 1933 book, Roll, Jordan, Roll, with text by Pullitzer prize winning author Julia Peterkin.

#dorisulmann #pictorialism  #vintageplatinumprints #1920sphotography #theschneidercollection #johnjacobniles
The Flat-Iron, a photogravure by Alfred Stieglitz The Flat-Iron, a photogravure by Alfred Stieglitz from Camera Work No. IV, 1903. 

Late in his life Stieglitz recalled: “One day there was a great snow storm. The Flat-Iron Building had been erected on 23rd Street, at the junction of Fifth Avenue and Broadway. I stood spellbound as I saw that building in that storm. I had watched the building in the course of its erection, but somehow it had never occurred to me to photograph it in the stages of its evolution. But that particular snowy day, with the trees of Madison Square all covered with snow, fresh snow, I suddenly saw the Flat-Iron Building as I had never seen it before. It looked, from where I stood, as if it were moving toward me like the bow of a monster ocean steamer, a picture of the new America which was in the making. So day after day for several days, while the snow was still covering Madison Square Park, I made snapshots of the Flat-Iron Building.

“One of these pictures I enlarged. That is, I had a photogravure made from the original negative, in fact, two photogravures, different sizes, both enlargements of the original negative, and proof pulled under my direct supervision. One enlargement was to be inserted into Camera Work; the other one was larger, about 11 × 14. This larger photogravure was one of a series of large prints I had in mind to be made for a portfolio, to be called Fifty Prints of New York. This series that I had in mind was never completed.”

As recorded by Dorothy Norman in “Alfred Stieglitz: Six Happenings. I: Photograph the Flat-Iron Building—1902–1903,” Twice a Year 14–15 (1946–1947), 188–189.

— National Gallery of Art

#stieglitz #flatiron #theflatiron #camerawork #cameraworkmagazine #oldnewyork #theschneidercollection #vintagephotogravures #mastersofphotography #flat-iron
Water Lilies, silver print on original mount, 1920 Water Lilies, silver print on original mount, 1920s, by an unknown German photographer. Image size: 13.5"x10"; Sheet Size: 13.5"x10" on mount 19.5"x19.5".

Schoninger Kunsthandlung Munich label on the verso, a major art dealer in Munich.

#vintagewaterlilies #vintagesilverprints #vintagephotography #vintagegermanphotography #1920sphotography #theschneidercollection #waterlilies  #waterlilyphotography
Apple Tree, c. 1970-1973, by Ruth Bernhard, a gela Apple Tree, c. 1970-1973, by Ruth Bernhard, a gelatin silver print, printed later, stamped on verso. Photographed in Santa Rosa, CA. 

“I saw it when I woke up in the morning. And it was the dew on that window and behind the window was that apple tree. And it had my name in big letters written all over it. You know when I print my things, I always print them one way the first time and then when I go back and later on, I print them again I print them very differently. And so I hardly ever have two prints that I like, because it depends on my mood and where it could be a little better, a little darker, a little lighter, and how quick the light could change, so you may have seen that print look quite different in the book.” — Ruth Bernhard

Transcribed from a recording on fansinaflashbulb.wordpress.com of Bernhard speaking at a Master Seminar at the ICP, October 17, 1981. 

So exciting to find this recording today. I fell in love with this image a few years ago and it took a while to find a print I could afford. 

While I rarely make images that are consciously influenced by other photographs, I did think of this one when sitting in my car waiting for the snow and ice to melt on the windshield and windows in early 2020. I looked next door at the coffee trees (my frequent subjects) and captured As the Snow Melts. It was interesting to learn that she rarely made the same print twice, as I usually alter my prints as well. I have to add, that while looking for this print, I saw many variations. 

#ruthbernhard #appletree #icp #throughthewindow #throughthedew #waterdroplets #theschneidercollection #wendischneider #vintagephotographs #gelatinsilverprints #mastersofphotography #famouswomenphotographers #womeninthearts
Prancing Snowflake, an archival pigment print by D Prancing Snowflake, an archival pigment print by Dawn Surratt @dawn_surratt. 

🤍 wishing you peace, good health and a bit of magic in the holidays & new year 🤍

#dawnsurratt #prancingsnowflake #whitedeer #fineartphotography #theschneidercollection
A Venetian Canal, 1894, a photogravure by Alfred S A Venetian Canal, 1894, a photogravure by Alfred Stieglitz from Picturesque Bits of New York and Other Studies, 1897. 

Influential in establishing photography as an art form in the United States, Stieglitz edited and published magazines, organized photographers, operated galleries, and crafted his own creative photographic images. He promoted the photogravure process as an original means of photographic printmaking.

Stieglitz had hands-on experience with photogravure and used it extensively for his work and the work of fellow pictorialists. He initially worked at the Photochrome Engraving Company in New York, where he gained intimate knowledge of photogravure and other printing processes. In 1897 Stieglitz issued Picturesque Bits Of New York And Other Studies, a portfolio of his own large-format gravures, for which he personally made the film positives for plate making. At this time, he marketed his individual photogravures as collectible, original works of art, numbering, signing and printing them in limited editions.
 
Stieglitz used the photogravure process for most of the illustrations in his groundbreaking periodicals, Camera Notes (1897–1903) and Camera Work (1903–1917). The photogravures in these journals, all personally approved by Stieglitz, enabled a larger audience to experience the artful qualities of photography. He was so confident of the quality of these gravures that he occasionally sent them to be displayed at international exhibitions of artistic photographs.

Stieglitz’s own work passed through three distinct phases. He began as a naturalist photographer, sensitively portraying rural lifestyles. He then transformed into a pictorialist, creating impressionistic pictures through soft-focus effects. Finally, he turned to modernism, embracing abstraction, photographic detail, and realistic tones.

— photogravure.com

#alfredstieglitz #picturesquebitsofnewyork #vintagephotography #vintagephotogravures #mastersofphotography #stieglitz #venicephotogravure #vintagevenice #theschneidercollection #wendischneider #venetiancanal
Broadway at Night, c.1910, a photogravure by Alvin Broadway at Night, c.1910, a photogravure by Alvin Langdon Coburn. The image appears in the New York portfolio, however this print, while mounted to the card, shows no evidence of having been mounted on a page of the book. 

Coburn was mesmerized by the electrified arc lamps of Midtown Manhattan. "It is only at twilight," he wrote in 1911, "that the city reveals itself to me in the fulness [sic] of its beauty, when the arc lights on the Avenue click into being. Many an evening I have watched them and studied carefully just which ones appeared first and why. They begin somewhere about Twenty-sixth street, where it is darkest, and then gradually the great white globes glow one by one, up past the Waldorf and the new Library, like the stringing of pearls, until they burst out into a diamond pendant at the group of hotels at Fifty-ninth street. Probably there is a man at a switchboard somewhere, but the effect is like destiny, and regularly each night, like the stars, we have this lighting up of the Avenue." —The Met

#alvinlangdoncoburn #newyorkatnight #broadwayatnight #vintagephotogravures #oldnewyork #vintagephotography #mastersofphotography #newyorkportfolio #theschneidercollection #wendischneider #oldstreetlights #vintagephotographycollection #nightstreets #nightlights #mastersofphotogravure #twilightlights #broadwaynewyork #nocturnes
Fifth Avenue from the St. Regis, c. 1905, a photog Fifth Avenue from the St. Regis, c. 1905, a photogravure from the suite of images by Alvin Langdon Coburn published in the New York portfolio, 1913. I have a few of my favorites from that suite. Not all show evidence of being mounted in the portfolio, including this one. Mounted only. 

#alvinlangdoncoburn #vintagephotogravures #oldnewyork #oldnewyorkphotographs #coburnphotogravures #coburnstregis #stregisnewyork #oldfifthavuenue #theschneidercollection #radiantaberration #wendischneider @wendischneiderart
Miss Doris Keane, 1909, a photogravure by Paul Bur Miss Doris Keane, 1909, a photogravure by Paul Burty Haviland from Camera Work No. 39, 1912.

Haviland was a French-American photographer, writer and art critic associated with Stieglitz and the Photo-Secession. Born in Paris June 17, 1880, his father owned Haviland & Co., a well-known china manufacturer in Limoges, and his mother was the daughter of art critic Philippe Burty. Haviland grew up surrounded by art, music and theater. He received an undergrad degree from the University of Paris, and went to grad school at Harvard. He worked in New York as a rep of his father's china firm, but he spent little time in his office. In 1908 he and his brother went to see the Rodin drawings at the Little Galleries of the Photo-Secession, where he met Stieglitz. Both he and his brother bought works and soon he and Stieglitz were engaged in discussions about art and culture. Haviland considered the gallery "a unique oasis of cultivation”. Stieglitz told him the gallery was going to close due to a rent increase, and without telling Stieglitz, Haviland signed a 3-year lease for a larger space across the hall. The next decade the two were nearly inseparable friends and colleagues, and in 1909, Haviland began writing for Camera Work; later that year his Portrait – Miss G.G., No 28, October. He was named associate editor, functioned as secretary of the gallery. Haviland won first prize in the John Wanamaker Exhibition of Photographs in Philly (judged by Stieglitz). Six more of his photographs were published in Camera Work (No 39, 1912) and 2 more in Camera Work (No 46, 1914). In 1915, Haviland teamed up with Agnes Ernest Meyer and Mario de Zayas. They were frustrated with Stieglitz’s handling of artists and felt the gallery was in a rut. Haviland soon became one of the driving forces and editors of a new magazine called 291. In 1916, he moved to France to deal with the family business and later married Suzanne Lalique, daughter of famous art nouveau glass designer René Lalique. — excepted and interpreted from Wiki

#cameraworkmagazine #cameraworkphotogravure #vintagephotogravures #vintagephotographs #paulhaviland #stieglitz #theschneidercollection
In the afternoon shadows … Torso – a photogravur In the afternoon shadows … Torso - a photogravure by Stieglitz and White, and Shell Corsage, a vase by Beverly Morris. 

#intheshadows #beverlymorrispottery #stieglitz #clarencewhite #cameraworkphotogravures #vintagephotogravures #camerworkmagazine #theschneidercollection
Plate 56, a photogravure by Doris Ulmann (American Plate 56, a photogravure by Doris Ulmann (American, 1882-1934) from the book Roll, Jordan, Roll, 1933, 21 x 16 cm

“Ulmann's photographic collaboration with Julia Peterkin focuses on the lives of former slaves and their descendants on a plantation in the Gullah coastal region of South Carolina. Peterkin, a popular novelist who won the Pulitzer Prize in 1929, was born in South Carolina and raised by a black nursemaid who taught her the Gullah dialect before she learned standard English. She married the heir to Lang Syne, one of the state's richest plantations, which became the setting for Roll, Jordan, Roll. Ulmann's soft-focus photos-rendered as tactile as charcoal drawings in the superb gravure reproductions here-straddle Pictorialism and Modernism even as they appear to dissolve into memory." — Roth, 101 Books

Roll, Jordan, Roll" (also "Roll, Jordan"), is a spiritual created by enslaved African Americans, developed from a song written by Isaac Watts in the 18th century which became well-known among slaves in the United States during the 19th century. Appropriated as a coded message for escape, by the end of the American Civil War it had become known through much of the eastern United States. In the 19th century, it helped inspire blues, and it remains a staple in gospel music. — Wikipedia

#dorisulmann #vintagephotogravures #handpulledphotogravure #1933 #rolljordanroll #theschneidercollection
Glass and Shadows, a photogravure by Baron Adolf d Glass and Shadows, a photogravure by Baron Adolf de Meyer from Camera Work XL, F. Bruckmann Verlag, Munich - 22.1 x 16.5 cm

The exquisite elegance and beauty of de Meyer’s masterful work in one of my favorite images and prints. It haunts me and seems a fitting post for All Hallow’s Eve…

#adolfdemeyer #barondemeyer #cameraworkmagazine #cameraworkphotogravure #stieglitz #vintagephotogravures #vintagephotographs #vintagestilllife #photogravure #shadowlovers #glassandshadows #theschneidercollection
Spring Showers, The Coach, 1900 – a photogravure b Spring Showers, The Coach, 1900 - a photogravure by Alfred Stieglitz in Camera Notes Vol. 5, No. 3, January, 1902. 

This image was only printed a few times by Stieglitz. The Met has this on their site about their platinum print:
“When he made this photograph, Stieglitz was vice president of the Camera Club of New York and editor of the club's journal, where he reproduced this image. Like his fellow Pictorialists, Stieglitz often emulated Whistler's delicate tonal effects by photographing in rain and snow. The then-current vogue for things Japanese is evident in the paper mount of this little picture, a contact print from the small negative made by a hand camera, Stieglitz's preferred tool for capturing movement in the streets. In 1913 Stieglitz made some of his early photographs into enlarged gravures, such as the one hanging to the right. It was probably when selecting the works for enlargement that Stieglitz gave this print to Marie Rapp, his secretary and assistant at his gallery. Almost certainly unique, this diminutive print preserves the original, surprisingly precious, aspect of works we have come to regard-from their later incarnations-as protomodern.”

And from the National Gallery of Art:
In the late 1890s Stieglitz began a series of photographs of New York that would explore the city’s “myriad moods, lights, and phases,”a theme he would revisit throughout his career.[35] Several works from this series were published as photogravures in Camera Notes,beginning in October 1901 with An Icy Night (1898) and continuing in January 1902 with Spring Showers: the Coach (1901) and Spring Showers: the Sweeper (1901). Stieglitz seems to have printed the two Spring Showers as well as another image made around this time,The Flatiron (1903) (Key Set number 288), only as small- and large-format photogravures.[36] NGA

Thanks again to @artofphotogravure! 

#stieglitz #alfredstieglitz #springshowersthecoach #springshowers #cameranotesphotogravures #vintagephotogravures #theschneidercollection #vintagephotographs #mastersofphotography #cameranotes #vintagephotographypublications #nycameraclub #cameraclubnewyork
Hydrangea, c. 1906-07, a photogravure by Adolf De Hydrangea, c. 1906-07, a photogravure by Adolf De Meyer, (1868-1946), from Camera Work No. 24, 1908. (corrected)

#demeyer #adolfdemeyer #adolphdemeyer #hydrangeas #vintageflowerphotography #vintagephotogravures #cameraworkphotogravure #cameraworkmagazine #vintagephoto #hydrangeainglass #flowersinglass #theschneidercollection
Cyclamen – Mrs. Philip Lydig, c.1905 – photogravur Cyclamen - Mrs. Philip Lydig, c.1905 - photogravure 7.5x5.8" on 11.3x8" handmade tissue paper from Camera Work Nos. 42/43, April/July 1913 

Rita de Acosta Lydig, 1875-1929
Collector Patron
New York, Paris, London

Rita Lydig, née Rita Hernandez de Alba de Acosta, was an art collector, patron, socialite and philanthropist.

Lydig was photographed, sculpted, and painted by artists such as Edward Steichen, Augustus Rodin, and John Singer Sargent. Counted among her friends were Edgar Degas, August Rodin, Leo Tolstoy, Sarah Bernhardt, Ethel Barrymore, and Claude Debussy.

Lydig’s collection included paintings, tapestries (Flemish and Burgundian), bronzes, majolica, French Limoges reliquary, German Crucifix, faience, sarcophagi, European and Asian porcelains. The collection included work by or attributed to, among others, Sandro Botticelli, Sano di Pietro, Neroccio Di Bartolomeo, Mattea di Giovanni, Alonso Sánchez Coello, Juan Bautista Martínez del Mazo, Matteo di Giovanni, Tintoretto, Antonio Moro, Alonso Sanchez, and Mazo, Mino da Fiesole, Giovanna da Bologna, Putti, and Andrea Riccio.

A catalog of her collection was cataloged by Wilhelm R. Valentiner with the assistance of Durr Friedley and was auctioned off in 1913 via the American Art association (selling for $362,555).

Lydig's sister, Mercedes de Acosta, gave Rita de Acosta's collection of clothes and shoes to the Metropolitan Museum of Art. — The Frick research.frick.org

#steichen #camerawork #cameraworkmagazine #stieglitz #RitaLydig #vintagephotogravures #vintagephotography #vintageportraits #tissuephotogravures #1905 #1913 #theschneidercollection #clyclamen #portraitswithflowers #1905portrait
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