Born in New York, Paul Strand (1890-1976) began studying with the social photographer Lewis Hine and later became close friends with Alfred Stieglitz, a photographer and pioneer in the introduction of modern art in the United States. Strand managed to merge these two trends and continued to explore until laying the foundations of modern photography and anticipating what in later years will be known as “direct photography”. His knowledge of contemporary art derived from his personal contacts with artists and art theorists, his intuition and his powers of synthesis all led him to create a body of work outside of his own time.

The work of this exceptional photographer bears witness to the dizzying transformation that took place in photography in the United States in the early 20th century. This catalog covers Strand’s entire output, including his experiments with abstraction, street-based portraits, close-ups of natural shapes and machines, and the projects he developed in the American Southwest, New England, Mexico, France, Italy, Scotland, Egypt, Morocco, Ghana and Romania.