The Addison's collection numbers over 20,000 objects. While the galleries can only accommodate a fraction of the collection, virtually the entire collection is accessible through the Museum Learning Center.

Placeholder Text

Click here to download Museum Learning Center Portfolio Guides.

Collection

Themes: Motion and Time

<<first <previous
next> last>>


View larger image
Bookmark and Share
Artist(s): Harold Edgerton (Fremont, NE, Apr 6, 1903 - Jan 4, 1990, Cambridge, MA)
Title: Golf Drive by Densmore Shute from Seeing the Unseen
Date: 1938
Dimensions: 14 in. x 11 in. (35.56 cm x 27.94 cm)
Medium: dye transfer color print
Credit Line: Addison Gallery of American Art, Phillips Academy, Andover, MA, gift of Katherine D. and Stephen C. Sherrill (PA 1971, and P 2005, 2007, 2010), 2006.42.7

Related Parent:

Related Siblings:

This object is a member of the following groups (click any group name to view all objects in that group):

Themes: Motion and Time
Themes: MLC Portfolio: Visualizing Science

Object Information

The miraculous photographs made by MIT-trained electrical engineer Harold Edgerton were born of a engineering experiment in which the whirling motion of a machine could be perceived to be “stopped” when synchronized with the application of the pulsing strobe light.  Quickly the principal was adapted to create strobe-flash photography by syncing the light of the strobe with an ordinary camera.  The resultant photographs are far from ordinary—they provide a glimpse into motion, speed, and time.  As photography historian John Szarkowski commented, “Although Edgerton’s basic motive has been informational, not aesthetic he has consistently made pictures that have been bold, stylish, and dramatic.”  Edgerton brought his new technology to photographic studies of speeding projectiles, moving animals, swinging athletes, and leaping dancers, showing not only how objects react to the impact of bullets and explode, splash, or drop in sequence, but also the powerful fluid motion of the human body swinging a tennis racquet, throwing a baseball, or skipping rope.  Both scientific and artistic, Edgerton’s photography makes time stand still and allows us to view the formerly-unseen and infinitely remarkable dynamics of motion.  

Exhibition History

This object was included in the following exhibitions:

One Thing Leads to Another…Selections from the Collection , Addison Gallery of American Art, 1/30/2016 - 3/20/2016

Your current search criteria is: Portfolio is "Themes: Motion and Time"