Joel Meyerowitz
American, born 1938
New York City
INV-1598
Joel Meyerowitz
American, born 1938January 1, 1983, printed 2002
New York City
Joel Meyerowitz American, born 1938 →21st Centurychromogenic color printphotograph
Date
January 1, 1983, printed 2002
Medium
Chromogenic print
Dimensions
Image: 40.6 × 51 cm (16 × 20 1/8 in.); Paper: 50.8 × 61.1 cm (20 × 24 1/16 in.)
Museum
Art Institute of Chicago
Location
Chicago, IL
Credit
Purchased with funds provided by The Woman's Board of The Art Institute of Chicago in memory of the September 11, 2001 national tragedy
Joel Meyerowitz is known for producing richly saturated images of daily American life and landscapes. Like Claude Monet, who created numerous studies of seasonal light falling on haystacks, Meyerowitz produced these images of the New York City skyline from his studio in varying amounts of light and at different times of day. With our knowledge of just how radically this skyline would change after the tragic events of September 11, 2001, however, the photographs become haunting records of a city that was. The twin towers of the World Trade Center—gently bathed in morning light, backlit, illuminated against the night sky—appear indestructible. After the attacks, Meyerowitz was the only photographer who was allowed unrestricted access to the nine-month cleanup at Ground Zero, where he made over 5,000 large-format images of the workers and the scene. He published this expansive record in Aftermath: World Trade Center Archive.
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