Barbara Crane

Barbara Crane (March 19, 1928 – August 7, 2019) was an American artist photographer born in Chicago, Illinois. Crane worked with a variety of materials including Polaroid, gelatin silver, and platinum prints among others. She was known for her experimental and innovative work that challenges the straight photograph by incorporating sequencing, layered negatives, and repeated frames. Naomi Rosenblum notes that Crane "pioneered the use of repetition to convey the mechanical character of much of contemporary life, even in its recreational aspects."

Crane was the recipient of fellowships and grants, such as the Illinois Arts Council Artists Fellowship (2001), National Endowment for the Arts Grant (1988, 1974), Polaroid Corporation Materials Grants (1979–1995), and John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Fellowship in Photography (1979). Crane has also been an honored educator for the National Society for Photographic Education (1993); a distinguished artist at the Union League Club in Chicago, Illinois (2006); and a distinguished artist at Brown University, Providence, Rhode Island (2006). Her awards also include the YWCA Outstanding Achievement Award (1987) and the Ruth Horwich Award to a Famous Chicago Artist (Chicago, Illinois, 2009). In 2013, Barbara Crane was named artist honoree at the Hyde Park Art Center in Chicago, Illinois.

Crane's work is represented in numerous public collections including the International Center for Photography, New York City; the George Eastman Museum, Rochester, NY; the Art Institute of Chicago; the J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles; the National Museum of Modern Art, Kyoto; the Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago; the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston; and the WestLicht Museum of Photography, Vienna, Austria. Crane then studied under Siskind at the Institute of Design, Illinois Institute of Technology, and received her MS from the Institute in 1966.

Crane's master's degree thesis focused on "sculptural patterns through abstractions of the human body."

While in the MA program at the Institute of Design at the Illinois Institute of Technology, Crane was hired to start and chair the photography program at New Trier High School in Winnetka, Illinois, where she taught for three years. Eighteen months after graduating from ID, she secured a position to teach photography at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago which she held from 1967 (becoming a full professor in 1978) through 1995. Neon Series (1969) is a series "juxtaposing neon lights over faces like ceremonial urban masks". Chicago Beaches and Parks (1972) series takes after the stylizations of street photography. Crane photographed unposed individuals during their visits to parks and beaches around Chicago. John Rohrbach notes, "they deliver a grand sociological study of public activity: dancing, wooing, tending to children, showing off, catching sun and even taking snapshots". Commuter Discourse (1978) focuses on light and shadow. Crane took photographs of rush-hour crowds using a 35mm Leica with a 21mm wide-angle lens. The resulting images depict exaggerated body parts and shadows that extend to the edges of the frame. The focus of the series lay in the bodies rather than the identities of the individuals. Wipe Outs (1986) also experiments with flash and overexposure. The overexposure erases individual identity but captures common human behaviors. Bibliotheque Nationale, Paris, France California Museum of Photography, University of California at Riverside, Riverside, CA Centre de photographie de Lectoure, Lectoure, France Center for Creative Photography, University of Arizona, Tucson, AZ Fonds Nationale D'Art Contemporaine, France Hammer Museum, Grunwald Center, University of California, Los Angeles, CA The JP Morgan Chase Art Collection J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles, CA Harry Ransom Center, University of Texas, Austin, TX High Museum of Art, Atlanta, GA International Center for Photography, New York, NY International Museum of Photography, George Eastman House, Rochester, NY John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, Chicago, IL John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation, New York, NY Kiyosato Museum of Photographic Art, Tokyo, Japan National Museum of Modern Art, Kyoto, Japan Library of Congress, Washington, DC Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Los Angeles, CA Minneapolis Institute of Arts, Minneapolis, MN Musee de L'Elysee, Lausanne, France Moderna Museet, Stockholm, Sweden Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago, IL Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, CA Museum of Contemporary Photography at Columbia College, Chicago, IL Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, TX Museum of Modern Art, New York, NY National Museum of American Art, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, DC The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, MO New York Public Library, New York, NY Norton Simon Museum, Pasadena, CA San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, San Francisco, CA Santa Barbara Museum of Art, Santa Barbara, CA Seattle Art Museum, Seattle, WA Sir Elton John Photography Collection Victoria and Albert Museum, London, England WestLicht Museum of Photography, Vienna, Austria