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The New Vision of Photography

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The explosive development of photography as a medium of untold

expressive power and as a primary vehicle of modern consciousness

occurred during the two decades immediately following the Great War. In

the aftermath of this first totally mechanized conflict, avant-garde artists,

commercial illustrators, and journalists turned to photography as if seeing

to discover through its mechanisms and materials something of the soul of

contemporary industrial society.

!hotography"s long-acnowledged power to mirror the face of the world

was #y no means a#andoned, #ut in the $%&'s and "('s a host of

unconventional forms and techni)ues suddenly flourished. *#stract

photograms, photomontages composed of fragmented images, the

com#ination of photographs with modern typography and graphic design in

posters and magazine pages+all were facets of what artist and theorist

szl /oholy-0agy 1$2%34$%567 enthusiastically descri#ed as a 8newvision8 rooted in the technological culture of the twentieth century.

 *n influential teacher at the 9auhaus in Germany, /oholy-0agy

championed unexpected vantage points and playful printing techni)ues to

engender a fresh rapport with the visi#le world 1$%2:.$$''.5%%7. ;ther

photographers in Germany, such as *ugust

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