Valise d'Adam
Item
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Title
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Valise d'Adam
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Type
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Photograph
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Description
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Against a backdrop of rusting metal, Frederick Sommer arranged a grouping of found objects. A clipboard clamp represents a head and shoulders while dirty, cracking doll's arms and legs provide more literal context, defining the object as a human body. Within that fragmented body, Sommer places a complete doll with its head pointed downward, as if ready to be born.
The photograph's French title, Valise d'Adam, or as Sommer translated it, Adam's Traveling Case, is a sly reference to the idea that man travels through woman into the world, and perhaps, woman even carries man through life.
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has dimension
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9 3/8 × 7 3/8" (23.6 × 18.8 cm)
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Creator
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Frederick Sommer
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Date
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1949
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Provenance
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Gift of the artist
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Rights
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© Frederick and Frances Sommer Foundation
