24 - Edward Steichen's Nature - LËT’Z ARLES Luxembourg Photography Award 2026

Jul 6, 2026 – Oct 4, 2026

Luxembourg-born American artist Edward Steichen led an exceptional and extraordinary career: a pioneer of pictorialism, a fashion and portrait photographer, a designer, a curator… tirelessly experimenting with all disciplines. This exhibition reflects his deep fascination with nature, revealed through rarely exhibited works from Luxembourg-based collections and remarkable loans from the Estate of Edward Steichen. Originally a painter, Edward Steichen explored the pictorial qualities and the interplay of light and shadow in photography. While his approach gradually shifted towards a more realistic and documentary vision, Steichen’s fascination with light and the atmosphere of nature continued to shape his evolving artistic vision. The passage of time and Steichen’s patient observation of nature are epitomized in his late unfinished project devoted to his Shadblow Tree. Over the course of the seasons, he methodically studied the tree’s transformation, photographing and filming it for nearly ten years: the experience of nature is like a continuous and dynamic performance, captured moment by moment. His compositions celebrate the natural geometry of certain plants (sunflowers, lotuses, etc.) in all their complexity, with a particular fascination with delphiniums: he not only photographed them extensively but also cultivated and hybridized them himself. Steichen did not limit himself to capturing nature as it existed; he also staged it through intimate portraits of family members, close friends, as well as commissioned photographs. Nature was both a backdrop and a collaborator, framing personal bonds and a shared appreciation for the natural world. His personal connection to nature extended beyond the lens. His self-portraits, magazines, and views of his exhibitions underscore his lifelong passion for cultivating beauty. For Steichen, gardening and photography were intertwined: two ways of bringing nature’s art to life and sharing it with the world. Ruud Priem