Untitled

Barbara Crane’s formative photographic years were spent at the IIT Institute of Design, the former New Bauhaus, under the tutelage of Aaron Siskind. As a result, her practice is marked by material and formal experimentation. In her series Chicago Loop (1976-1978), abstraction meets figuration as she renders Chicago’s cityscape unfamiliar. Traversing the space of what most resembles a side-lit stage, the pedestrians in this photograph could be anywhere. Removed from the specificity of their city context, they are a graphic band at the bottom of a photographic composition, in which the deep, black backdrop dominates the space. Barely a cityscape, the architecture has disappeared into the depths of extreme tonal contrast, leaving only the pavement visible.