Joel Sternfeld
B. United States, 1944
The Works
24
Joel Sternfeld
After a Flash Flood, Rancho Mirage, California
1979
Dye transfer print, printed 1981
Joel Sternfeld
Mclean, Virginia, December
1978
Dye transfer print
Joel Sternfeld
Kansas City, Kansas, May
1983
C-type print, printed 1985
Joel Sternfeld
Coeburn, Virginia, April
1981
Dye transfer print, printed 1980s
Joel Sternfeld
Rustic Canyon, Santa Monica, California, May
1979
Dye transfer print, printed 1985
Joel Sternfeld
Approximately 17 of 41 Sperm Whales Which Beached and Subsequently Died, Florence, Oregon, June
1979
Dye transfer print, printed 1980s
Joel Sternfeld
Abandoned Uranium Refinery, near Tuba City, Navajo Nation, August
1982
Dye transfer print, printed 1980s
Joel Sternfeld
Red Rock State Campground (Boy), Gallup, New Mexico, September
1982
C-type print, printed 1985
Joel Sternfeld
Park City, Utah, August
1979
C-type print, printed 1982
Joel Sternfeld
Family in a Car in Tent City, Outside of Houston, Texas, January
1983
C-type print, printed 1984
Joel Sternfeld
Kitt Peak National Observatory, Pima County, Arizona, August
1979
C-type print, printed 1980
Joel Sternfeld
Beverly Hills, California, May
1979
C-type print, printed 1979
Joel Sternfeld
Saint Johnsbury, Vermont, March
1983
C-type print, printed 1987
Joel Sternfeld
Monongahela River, Grafton, West Virginia, February
1983
C-type print, printed 1987
Joel Sternfeld
Ketchum, Idaho, October
1980
C-type print, printed 1981
Joel Sternfeld
Virginia on the Potomac, November
1978
C-type print, printed 1980
Joel Sternfeld
A Kickapoo Man in Eagle Pass Texas, January
1983
C-type print, printed 1983
Joel Sternfeld
Sudden Summer Storm, Connecticut
c. 1977
C-type print, printed c. 1980s
Joel Sternfeld
Two Motels in Las Cruces, New Mexico
1986
C-type print, printed 1987
Joel Sternfeld
Agoura, California, February
1988
C-type print, printed 1988
Joel Sternfeld
Member of the Christ Family Religious Sect, Hidalgo County, Texas, January
1983
C-type print, printed 1984
Joel Sternfeld
Architecture Museum, Provincetown, Massachusetts, July
1980
C-type print, printed 1981
Joel Sternfeld
A Railroad Artifact, 30th Street, May
2000
Archival pigment print
Joel Sternfeld
Looking East on 30th Street on a Late September Morning
2000
Archival pigment print
B. United States 1944
Biography
Joel Sternfeld began taking photographs in 1970 having studied the colour theory of artists Johannes Itten and Josef Albers. Early work included street photography on small and medium format cameras. In 1978, Sternfeld embarked on a road-trip which traversed the United States. Using an 8 x 10 inch camera, Sternfeld photographed the communities, culture, landscapes and quotidian life he encountered along the way.
American Prospects is seen as a continuation of the American documentary tradition established in the 1930s by Walker Evans and continued by Robert Frank twenty years later. Sternfeld expanded the trajectory of the medium by photographing scenes rich in implied narrative, which were also distinct in their colour and composition. Laced with a touch of irony, his photographs from the project explore American identity in a thought provoking yet humorous manner. His masterful use of colour heightens the tensions in these comic depictions of everyday life in America. First exhibited at the Museum of Modern Art, New York and then published in book form in 1987, American Prospects is regarded as one of the most influential bodies of photographic work from this period. Sternfeld’s later work has continued to experiment with colour and put it to use in documenting everyday events and the people he encounters.
Sternfeld was born in New York City in 1944, and earned a BA in Art from Dartmouth College. His work has been the subject of multiple exhibitions in museums and galleries worldwide, including the Museum of Modern Art, New York, The Art Institute of Chicago, Illinois, the Museum Folkwang Essen, Germany, the Albertina Museum of Vienna, Austria and C/O Berlin, Germany. Sternfeld has received numerous awards including two Guggenheim fellowships, a Prix de Rome and the Citibank Photography Award. He holds the Noble Foundation Chair in Art and Cultural History at Sarah Lawrence College.
He lives and works in New York.
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4
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