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About how a photographer treates light and why photography became a fine-art form

Light Is a Plastic Medium showcases the work of Carlotta Corpron, a pioneering figure in midcentury American abstract photography, and positions her within the rise of photography as a fine-art form in itself, set to rival the traditional mediums of painting and sculpture.

Light Is a Plastic Medium showcases photographs by Carlotta Corpron, a pioneering figure in American abstract photography active from the mid-1930s through the mid-’50s. Her career was brief but visionary, resulting in six bodies of work that explore the poetics of light through innovative uses of camera technology. The most comprehensive survey of Corpron’s work to date, this catalogue traces the evolution of her practice from nature photography and gestural light drawings to complex expansions and distortions of space achieved through her use of reflective surfaces and innovative light-modulating devices.

Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, DC October 16, 2026–March 14, 2027
Artists
Carlotta Corpron
Edited by
Betsy Johnson
Contributions by
M. Chiu|B. Fellman|H. Lust|B. Johnson
Product Safety
Hirmer Verlag GmbH, Bayerstr. 57-59, 80335 München, mail@hirmerverlag.de, Safety instruction according to Art. 9 Para. 7 Sentence 2 of the GPSR not required.

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