Art of the American Snapshot Exhibit

I really enjoyed The Art of the American Snapshot 1888-1978 exhibit at the National Gallery of Art on its opening day two weeks ago. The exhibit is contained in several rooms and the photographs are arranged in chronological order. Many of the prints were humorous or contained an element of surprise. One of my favorites was a small circular silver gelatin print taken sometime after 1888 of a large fishbowl placed outdoors on a wicker stand. The light on the glass and the water is what first catches your eye, but looking a little closer, you notice that there were five or six slightly ominous baby alligators swimming in the fishbowl. The collection of approximately 200 snapshots is definitely worth seeing and is on display until December 31, 2007.

I have been interested in old photographs for as long as I can remember, but that exhibit has renewed my interest in old family snapshots and has changed the way I see them. Here's one of my sister and me on a family vacation in Minnesota a few years ago. My father probably snapped this one...


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