Must-See Man Ray @ The Met Museum – 2025
Photos © Man Ray 2015 Trust ©The Metropolitan Museum of Art. Collage Helen Oppenheim
“When Objects Dream” at the Metropolitan Museum of Art is the first major exhibition to examine the radical experimentation of American artist Man Ray (1890-1976) through one of his most significant bodies of work, the rayograph. Man Ray coined the term rayograph to name his version of the 19th century technique of making photographs without a camera. He created them by placing objects on or near a sheet of light-sensitive paper, which he then exposed to light and developed. These photograms – as they are called – appear as reversed silhouettes, or negative versions of their subjects. They often feature recognizable items that become wonderfully mysterious in the artist’s hands.
The must-see exhibition, September 14, 2025 to February 1, 2026, explores the rayographs, Man Ray’s paintings and photographs. Included some of his most famous masterpieces – Le violon d’Ingres, Noire et blanche, Glass Tears and Kiki de Montparnasse, Man Ray’s lover, model, muse, with whom he worked from 1921-1929, creating some of his best-known works.
Top L-R : Man Ray rayograph with poster, Photo Ben Blackwell… Rayograph print, from Champs Délicieux 1922, one of 12 rayographs which open the exhibition … Man Ray Self Portrait in 31 bis rue Campagne-Premiere Studio, 1925 … Le violon d’Ingres, 1924, which the torso of the artist Kiki de Montparnasse (Alice Prin) is depicted as a musical instrument. Photo: Ian Reeves
2nd Row L-R : Noire et blanche, 1926, a surrealistic image featuring Kiki de Montparnasse with an African ceremonial mask … Marchesa Luisa Casati, 1922, eccentric Italian aristocrat and muse, known for her extravagant style, photographed with three pairs of eyes, the surreal image being a portrait of her soul … Solarized portrait of Photographer/PhotoJournalist Lee Miller, 1930, a Man Ray muse and lover.
3rd Row L-R : Glass Tears, 1932, surrealistic photograph, of a fashion mannequin, with silent film influences, showing stress after his break up with Lee Miller … Marine, 1925, a rayograph … Elsa Schiaparelli photographed by Man Ray in 1931. Schiaparelli is one of the major funders for the exhibition made possible by the Barrie A and Deedee Wigmore Foundation.
Collage by Helen Oppenheim
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