Photo-Transformation

Lucas Samaras

November 30, 1973 · Instant internal dye diffusion transfer print (Polaroid SX-70) · Photographs

Samaras was already well known as a sculptor, painter, and performance artist when he began experimenting with photography in 1969. Working with a Polaroid camera, he created hundreds of lush, idiosyncratic images of his favorite subject: himself. In his Photo-Transformations series of 1973-76, Samaras extended the formal possibilities of the Polaroid by using his hand or a stylus to gouge, smear, and stipple the wet dye emulsions of the instant prints while they were developing. Here, the artist seems to dissolve into a watery reflection while his fist threatens to punch through the picture plane into the viewer's space.

Artist

Lucas Samaras

Date

November 30, 1973

Medium

Instant internal dye diffusion transfer print (Polaroid SX-70)

Department

Photographs

Credit line

Gift of Arnold and Milly Glimcher, 1986