
Dusk
<p>To create this diptych, Eve Sonneman paired two images, taken moments apart, of tourists on an observation deck. Their shadows, as well as the photographer’s, loom large and draw attention to the darkening of the sky in the moment between the frames. By displaying images shot in rapid succession, Sonneman challenged the notion of the “decisive moment,” a reigning idea in mid-century pho-tography according to which the best picture is the one that entirely sums up a scene in a single instant. Instead, Sonneman suggests that photography can reveal time to be arbitrary and mutable, never fully frozen by the camera.</p>
Catalogue
- Year
- 1976
- Dimensions
- Each image: 15.4 × 23.5 cm (6 1/8 × 9 5/16 in.); Paper: 20.1 × 25.1 cm (7 15/16 × 9 15/16 in.)
- Collection
- Art Institute of Chicago
- Artist
- Eve Sonneman
Artist

Photography
Eve Sonneman is an American photographer working primarily in color and black-and-white series photography since the 1970s. Her practice centers on sequential imagery and diptychs that explore spatial relationships, memory, and the passage of time within urban and domestic environments. Sonneman's work emphasizes the photograph as a discrete unit within a larger narrative structure, resisting the single-frame convention of documentary photography.
Full artist profile →More
More by Eve Sonneman
Sight/Sound
1977 · Silver dye-bleach prints (2)
Traps, Paris
1977 · Silver dye-bleach prints (2)
Teeth Cases, Mexico
1975 · Gelatin silver print
San Francisco
1968 · Gelatin silver print
Laura, New Mexico
1968 · Gelatin silver print
Seawall, San Francisco
1968 · Gelatin silver print
Record
Verified by WattsOS- Artist
- Eve Sonneman
- Year
- 1976
- Dimensions
- Each image: 15.4 × 23.5 cm (6 1/8 × 9 5/16 in.); Paper: 20.1 × 25.1 cm (7 15/16 × 9 15/16 in.)
- Watts ID
- WW-1976-116305
Source
- Collection
- Art Institute of Chicago
- Source
- aic
- Reference
- View at source
- Status
- verified





