Dorothea Lange's America: Photographs of the Great Depression

Event Details

June 22, 2021 to August 14, 2021
"Dorothea Lange's America: Photographs of the Great Depression" presents a focused retrospective of original lifetime prints by the legendary photographer, Dorothea Lange. Highlighting this show are oversized exhibition prints of her famous portraits, including White Angel Breadline, Migratory Farm Worker, and, most famously, Migrant Mother - an emblematic picture that came to personify pride and resilience in the face of abject poverty in 1930s America. This exhibit will focus on education, artistry, cultural awareness and history.
Lange herself had known adversity early in life. At age 7 she was stricken with polio with left her with a lifetime limp. At age 12 her father disappeared from the scene, leaving an impoverished household behind. She talked her way into photo courses with a range of teachers and in 1918, when she moved to San Francisco, she befriended photographers such as Ansel Adams. With the crash of 1929 she found her true calling, as a chronicler of the many faces of America, old and young, urban and rural, native-born and immigrant, as they dealt with unprecedented hardship sometimes with resilience, often with despondence. Her immortal portraits seared these faces of the Depression Era into America’s consciousness.

We will be supplementing this exhibit by inviting western Kansas residents to temporarily loan Depression Era photographs, household items, family heirlooms, possibly even farming implements. These artifacts and the exhibit images will be a reminder of how much the Great Depression and the Dust Bowl are Kansas stories. If you or someone you know is interested in loaning items for this exhibit period, please fill in the back of this card and send it to the Stauth Museum so we can put you onto the mailing list so we can contact you closer to the exhibit opening.

The Museum would like to enhance this traveling exhibit with photographs and artifacts that depict "life in southwest Kansas" during the Great Depression. Family or farm photographs, household items, family heirlooms, possibly even farming implements, etc. used for everyday life during this time period are wanted. All photographs will be photocopied and enlarged to ensure the originals are not damaged during the exhibit period. If you are interested in loaning a photograph or an item, please fill out this form and leave it with Museum staff or mail it back to the address at the bottom of the page. We will contact you closer to the exhibition dates to work out specific details.