Camera Work, Nos. 49–50

The final double-issue of Camera Work, in June 1917, was devoted exclusively to Strand’s photographs and included eleven photogravures printed directly on the heavy journal page rather than on tipped-in Japanese tissue. The result was less precious, more direct, more modern and more “brutal,” in Stieglitz’s words. After years of relative disinterest in photography, of little picture making of his own, and pallid enthusiasm for the work of others, Stieglitz wrote effusively about Strand’s work: “The eleven photogravures in this number represent the real Strand. The man who has actually done something from within. The photographer who has added something to what has gone before. The work is brutally direct. Devoid of all flim-flam; devoid of trickery and of any ‘ism;’ . . . . These photographs are the direct expression of today.”