Exhibition - The War Through Steichens Eyes

Combat Photography in the Pacific 1943 - 1945

This exhibit features 50 photographs from the museum's collection on display for the first time. Steichen and the photographers under his supervision produced many of the most famous images of the war in the Pacific. Additional photographs, documents and artifacts chronicle the extraordinary life of one of America’s most accomplished photographers. Already one of the world’s foremost photographers with a lucrative career in the fashion industry, Edward Steichen could have avoided service in World War II. He was 62 years old when the war broke out and had already served his adopted country as a combat photographer in World War I. Instead, Steichen enlisted and became director of the Naval Photographic Institute. He and the photographers working for him produced some of the most dramatic and enduring images of World War II in the Pacific. Steichen’s war film “The Fighting Lady” won the 1945 Academy Award for best documentary. He went on to become the first curator of photography at the Museum of Modern Art in New York. He is considered one of the most important and influential photographers of the 20th century. His work is on display at museums and galleries around the world including the Getty Museum in Los Angeles, New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art and the National Gallery of Art in Washington D.C.

Location: The Gould-Eddy Gallery on board Berkeley