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1906 San Francisco Earthquake: Vintage
Photographs of Earthquake Sites presents a collection of photographs
of scenes of destruction left in the aftermath of the 1906 San Francisco
earthquake taken both during and after the subsequent fire that caused
widespread destruction of the city. Noteworthy about this collection is
that the photographs are almost exclusively the work of a number of fine
professional photographers who were living in the city at the time and
speak directly to the high level of individuality and experimentation of
photographers working in San Francisco at the turn of the century, a
distinction that continues in San Francisco today. These works present
signature points of view and confident artistic expressions in addition to
serving as documents of historical record.
The focus of this exhibition is primarily
aesthetic rather than documentary. Unlike photographs of the 1906
earthquake which are familiarities in San Francisco family scrapbooks, or
images which were made for insurance companies, the photographs in this
exhibition are almost exclusively done by professionals who were
responding to the artistic as well as the documentary quality of the
altered cityscape. Most recognizable are the references to classical Greek
and roman ruins of architecture that would have been familiar to
photographers at the turn of the century. |
