John Harvard's Journal
Lyonel Feininger, Photographer


Untitled (Night View of Trees and Streetlamp, Burgkühnauer Allee, Dessau), 1928
Image courtesy of the Department of Digital Imaging and Visual Resources, Harvard Art Museums © 2011 President and Fellows of Harvard College


Untitled (Second Avenue El from Window of 235 East 22nd Street, New York), 1939
Courtesy of Houghton Library, Harvard University


Untitled (Street Scene, Double Exposure, Halle), 1929–30
Courtesy of Houghton Library, Harvard University


Untitled (Trees and Shadows, Burgkühnauer Allee, Dessau), April 1, 1929
Courtesy of Houghton Library, Harvard University


Halle Market with the Church of St. Mary and the Red Tower, 1929–30
Courtesy of Houghton Library, Harvard University


“Negative=Positive,” August 14, 1954
Image courtesy of the Department of Digital Imaging and Visual Resources, Harvard Art Museums © 2011 President and Fellows of Harvard College


Untitled (Beach Scene), July 17, 1911
Image courtesy of the Department of Digital Imaging and Visual Resources, Harvard Art Museums © 2011 President and Fellows of Harvard College


Big News!, January 1, 1909
Image courtesy of the Department of Digital Imaging and Visual Resources, Harvard Art Museums, © 2011 President and Fellows of Harvard College


“Feux Follets,” 1940
Image courtesy of the Department of Digital Imaging and Visual Resources, Harvard Art Museums, © 2011 President and Fellows of Harvard College


Bicycle Race, 1912
Image courtesy of the Department of Digital Imaging and Visual Resources, Harvard Art Museums, © 2011 President and Fellows of Harvard College


Untitled (Four Figures), 1935
Image courtesy of the Department of Digital Imaging and Visual Resources, Harvard Art Museums, © 2011 President and Fellows of Harvard College
American-born Lyonel Feininger (1871-1956) was an illustrator and cartoonist active in Germany who in 1907 gave up his commercial work and rose to prominence as an artist who exhibited with the expressionists. Much of his formal work was heavily influenced by cubism, to which he was exposed in Paris in 1911. His resulting “prismatic” style was applied most frequently to architectural subjects—in 1919, Walter Gropius chose Feininger as his first appointment to the teaching staff of the Weimar Bauhaus—but also to figures and seascapes. Though best known for his drawings and watercolors, Feininger took up photography at the age of 57, going out at night to experiment with avant-garde photographic techniques. A selection of his rarely seen photographs, along with drawings and watercolors, will be on display from March 30 to June 2 at the Sackler Museum, and an online collection of his photographic works is accessible at www.harvardartmuseums.org/feiningerphotographs.