To make this series, Katy Grannan turned the sun-drenched streets of California into an impromptu portrait studio. Each photograph is the result of an on-the-spot collaboration, made with the willing participation of her subjects, who she compensates for their time. Often using stark white walls as a backdrop, Grannan creates images that evoke the spontaneity of candid street photography and capture the individuality of her subjects—creating a tension between anonymity and the desire to be seen.

Additional text from

Seeing Through Photographs online course, Coursera, 2017

Medium Inkjet print
Dimensions 55 × 41" (139.7 × 104.1 cm)
Credit The Photography Council Fund
Object number 455.2013
Department Photography

Explore more

Articles and videos

Licensing

Artwork or archival images

If you would like to reproduce an image of a work of art in MoMA's collection, or an image of a MoMA publication or archival material (including installation views, checklists, and press releases), please contact Art Resource (publication in North America) or Scala Archives (publication in all other geographic locations).

Audio and film clips

MoMA licenses archival audio and select out of copyright film clips from our film collection. At this time, MoMA produced video cannot be licensed by MoMA/Scala. All requests to license archival audio or out of copyright film clips should be addressed to Scala Archives at [email protected]. Motion picture film stills cannot be licensed by MoMA/Scala. For access to motion picture film stills for research purposes, please contact the Film Study Center at [email protected]. For more information about film loans and our Circulating Film and Video Library, please visit Circulating Film and Video Library.

Text from a publication or the archives

If you would like to reproduce text from a MoMA publication, please email [email protected]. If you would like to publish text from MoMA's archival materials, please fill out this permission form and send to [email protected].

Feedback

This record is a work in progress. If you have additional information or spotted an error, please fill out this feedback form.