Following her eight years of expatriate life in Paris, Abbott saw New York with European eyes. In this view, made shortly after her return, she captured the random disorder of urban activity as handily as her friend the dadaist poet Tristan Tzara, who put it this way: "We leave with those leaving arrive with those arriving/leave with those arriving arrive when the others leave."
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Inscription: Signed on 1st mount, verso UC: "Berenice Abbott"; stamped on 1st mount, verso C: "BERENICE ABBOTT // 50 COMMERCE STREET // NEW YORK 14, N.Y."; inscribed on 1st mount, verso UC: "CAMERA 4 // TIEFDRUCK"; inscribed on 1st mount, verso LC: "Lincoln Square // NEW YORK"; inscibed on 1st mount, verso LR: "STREET SCENE [crossed out] // NEW YORK CITY"; inscribed on 1st mount, verso UL: "19 (30-39)";
[Daniel Wolf, New York]; John C. Waddell, New York (July 13, 1981)
According to JCW, possibly Ex Coll Paul Katz.
The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "The New Vision: Photography between the World Wars. The Ford Motor Company Collection at The Metropolitan Museum of Art," September 23–December 31, 1989.
San Francisco Museum of Modern Art. "The New Vision: Photography between the World Wars. The Ford Motor Company Collection at The Metropolitan Museum of Art," February 28–April 22, 1990.
Los Angeles County Museum of Art. "The New Vision: Photography between the World Wars. The Ford Motor Company Collection at The Metropolitan Museum of Art," May 10–July 15, 1990.
High Museum of Art. "The New Vision: Photography between the World Wars. The Ford Motor Company Collection at The Metropolitan Museum of Art," February 5–April 28, 1991.
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. "The New Vision: Photography between the World Wars. The Ford Motor Company Collection at The Metropolitan Museum of Art," June 8–August 4, 1991.
IVAM, Centre Julio Gonzalez, Valencia. "The New Vision, IVAM, Centre Julio Gonzalez, Valencia," January 20, 1995–March 26, 1995.
New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "New York New York," May 7–September 15, 2002.
Amon Carter Museum of American Art. "American Modern: Documentary Photography by Abbott, Evans and Bourke-White," October 2, 2010–January 2, 2011.
Colby College Museum of Art. "American Modern: Documentary Photography by Abbott, Evans and Bourke-White," July 9, 2011–October 2, 2011.
The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "Photography between the Wars: Selections from the Ford Motor Company Collection." The Metropolitan Museum of Art Bulletin (Spring 1988). p. 49.
“The only pleasure you can get from creating something is the pleasure you have in doing it, not the final product even,” the photographer Berenice Abbott once said of her work.
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