Fire Escapes, New York
1965 · Gelatin silver print
Image/paper: 19.8 × 19.3 cm (7 13/16 × 7 5/8 in.); Mount: 43.2 × 35.2 cm (17 1/16 × 13 7/8 in.)
Art Institute of Chicago
WATTS INDEXThe canonical database of visual culture
Ralph Steiner
American, 1899
Cleveland, OH, USA
PhotographyPhotography
Representation
None documented
21
Institutional Exhibitions
57
Works in Collection
98
Assets Indexed
4
Authority-backed Facts
0
Publications Referenced
90%
Profile Completeness
Cultural Positioning
Movements
- • Photography
Related Artists
No edges recorded
Influence Graph
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Selected Institutional Exhibitions
View all exhibitions →No image
Variants
Museum of Modern Art, New York
1985–1986
No image
Reinstallation of the Collection
Museum of Modern Art, New York
1980
No image
In the Twenties: Portraits from the Photography Collection
Museum of Modern Art, New York
1979–1980
No image
Art of the Twenties
Museum of Modern Art, New York
1979–1980
No image
Photography for Collectors
Museum of Modern Art, New York
1976
About
Why this artist matters now
Ralph Steiner was an American photographer and filmmaker whose work ranged from precisionist still lifes and industrial studies to documentary films exploring labor and social conditions. Active from the 1920s through the 1980s, he employed photography as both a formal investigation into geometry and light and a tool for social advocacy. His images of commonplace objects and urban landscapes demonstrated an austere aesthetic that influenced American modernist photography. He also directed and produced documentary films that engaged directly with political and economic themes of the mid-twentieth century.
Source: Moma Bulk 2026 05 04 · Trust score: 92% · Updated 25d ago
Graph relationships
Taste overlap and adjacency
Movement
Photography
Medium
Photography
Related Artists
12 in graph
Institutional
Museum Collections
Canonical record
Artworks (57)
View all 57 artworks →
Record
Images
Related artists
Adjacent in the graph
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Record
Movements and affiliations
Institutional
Representation & Collections
In collection
The Metropolitan Museum of Art
In collection
Cleveland Museum of Art
In collection
Art Institute of Chicago
In collection
Museum of Modern Art
New York, US
Market
Auction sale history
Houses that have sold works by this artist at auction
Record