I'd been having a long chat about Robert Crumb just before I went to MoMA, so this caught my eye...
A short post on an institution and gallery that, I feel, has a hugely significant place in the history of photography. The Museum of Modern Art has always been a champion of photography, in particular the institution supported the work and art of many New York photographers in the early to mid twentieth century, with the Cartier-Bresson's, Capa's, Weegee's, and so on, receiving cultural stamps of approval from MoMAs acquisition of their work.
This significance is noted by many, in MoMAs official histories (such as the Cartier-Bresson focussed, 'The Modern Century'), the foundation of photographic institutions such as Magnum, and the history of New York publications such as Life magazine. Through the acquisition of works by a wide range of photographers who can broadly be termed as 'photojournalists' MoMA underscored the significance and viability of this way of seeing the city and the world.
As a result, it backed a vision and imaginative geography which came to define the twentieth century in New York and the world at large. The effect on New York was particularly marked, with the way of seeing developed by these photographers still defining how the urban landscape is imagined to this day - as illustrated by the deployment of various photojournalist tropes in the New York Historical Society's 'New York Story' video.
Today the photography gallery at MoMA underscores this, without ever explicitly stating the significance of the museum and the gallery's history. To wander around the space is to see a succession of photographic works which defined ways of seeing in New York and in the world at large; ways of seeing which were supported by MoMAs patronship of these photographers and their perspectives in the vulnerable early days of their art.