Sander Portraits I

 Here is a sampling of the 600 portraits by August Sander currently on view at the Yale Art Gallery.

On the left we have a portrait of a Nazi SS Captain.  On the right is a diplomat.

A pharmacist.

On the left,  an Industrial Magnate.  On the right, a bricklayer from Cologne.

A master shoemaker.

A painter couple.

The director of a wax museum.

Aren't these brilliant?  More tomorrow.

August Sander at the Yale Art Gallery

 Why so many New Haven photos recently?  I went to the Yale Art Gallery to see an exhibition of more than 600 black and white portrait photographs by German photographer, August Sander, from the first half of the 20th century.  It is a brilliant exhibition and Sander was a brilliant portrait photographer.

Sander called his exhibition People of the 20th Century.  He grouped them by classes, occupations, and backgrounds, arranging them into groups like "The Farmer" "The Skilled Tradesman," "The Woman" and "Classes and Professions."

Today I am showing some walls of portraits.  In the next couple of days, I will show a few close-ups.

New Haven Superior Court

 

This is a color photograph, not black and white.

Sky

The June theme for City Daily Photo participants is "Sky."  This is a theme made for me.  When clouds in a rich blue sky make beautiful patterns, I can't look away.

Puffs above a palm tree in Naples.

Lovely low cumulus clouds at a Sanibel beach with wispy clouds higher.

Two sky views from the golf course in Naples.

And a morning view from my Naples home.

Theodore Dwight Woolsey

A statue of longtime Yale President Theodore Dwight Woolsey sits at a prominent location in Yale Old Campus.  Woolsey graduated as valedictorian of the Yale Class of 1820 and later served as a professor of Greek from 1831 to 1846.

Woolsey's uncle Timothy Dwight had been Yale's President from 1795 to 1817.  Woolsey was elected President in 1846 and served until 1871.  Another Dwight relative followed.  During his 25 years as president, Yale advanced in wealth and influence and two new departments, the Scientific School and the School of Fine Arts, were begun.

Sterling Memorial Library

In the heart of Yale's central campus, Sterling Memorial Library is the university’s largest library and one of its most iconic buildings.  It is built in the Collegiate Gothic style to resemble a European cathedral. 

Completed in 1930, it houses more than 2.5 million volumes, with a focus on humanities and area studies.  Designed by architect James Gamble Rogers (Yale Class of 1889) and later named for its benefactor, John William Sterling (Yale Class of 1864), 

The main entrance, known as the Nave, has a 60-foot ceiling, cloisters, clerestory windows, side chapels, and a circulation desk altar.  

Stained glass windows throughout the building—3,300 in all—were designed by artist G. Owen Bonawit. 

One of the grand spaces in Sterling Memorial Library is the Starr Main Reference Room.  It features medieval-style stained-glass windows, hand-carved details, and a wood-coffered ceiling.

One of the portraits in the Nave is of Edward Alexander Bouchet, a physicist and educator.  Boucher was the first African American graduate of Yale College and the first African American awarded a Ph.D. in the United States.

"King" William Lanson

William Lanson was a Freeman in New Haven in the first half of the 19th century. He was a master builder, widely respected for his leadership.  This 2020 statue stands at the foot of two of Yale's newest residential colleges.

With others he founded the Temple Street Church. He led a petition campaign to the Connecticut General Assembly for the vote for Freemen.   The slogan was "no taxation without representation."

 

In 1825, Lanson was elected Black Governor of the State of Connecticut, extending assistance to the impoverished Black community. He was then hired to build the New Haven section of the Farmington Canal, which would allow New Haven products to be sent by sail to Massachusetts.

He built and owned a hotel that served as a refuge for runaway slaves and traveling Black workers.  He owned several properties that he rented out to White and Black families.  This brought down the wrath of New Haven authorities, who constantly harassed him with false charges, and penalized and imprisoned him, seizing his properties.  William Lanson ended up impoverished and died in the alms house.