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American, Street Scene #3, Harlem, 1935. Gelatin silver print. Gift of Michael Shapiro, Emory University '77, in honor of Dr. Steven E. Sanderson. 1998.4.12
Siskind began serious photography in the early 1930s in New York as a member of the Photo League. This particular photograph was part of a League project known as the "Harlem Document," an undertaking that stemmed from the group's commitment to using photography as a means of recording social conditions. Siskind's challenge in these years was to find a balance between the aesthetic image and the social document. After 1940, formal and symbolic concerns were to become more important to Siskind's work than this documentary approach.
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