Sculpted by Light
Photography and Sculpture
Geraldine A. JohnsonHow photography and sculpture have transformed each other
This book explores the fascinating and often unexpected ways photography and sculpture have intersected over the past two centuries. It examines photographs of classical sculpture by pioneers like Talbot and Daguerre, Modernists such as Steichen and Brâncuși captivated by light and shadow, and contemporary practitioners including Mapplethorpe and Goldin who explore gender and identity. Photographers from Africa, Asia and Latin America also feature. Sculpted by Light reveals how photography generates new sculptural works – as when Brassaï transformed found objects into ‘involuntary sculptures’ – and how photographs can animate a statue or freeze a living body. Photographs, Geraldine Johnson argues, are also objects with sculptural qualities of their own and can influence debates about controversial public monuments. By approaching these media from varied perspectives, Sculpted by Light offers fresh insights into both.
Introduction: Photographing Sculpture, Sculpting Photography
1. Beginnings, West: Sculpture as Photographic Subject and the Classical Tradition
2. Beginnings, East: Photography and the Invention of East Asian Sculpture
3. Image to Art: Documenting and Dematerializing Sculpture
4. Working Stiffs: Photographers of Sculpture and Photographs of Sculptors
5. Transformations: Bodies into Statues, Sculpture into Beings
6. The Photographic Object and the Object of Photography
7. The Politics of Photographing Sculpture
8. Art History’s Images: Visual Historiography and the Photography of Sculpture
Conclusion: Making Sculpture Visible and Photography Tangible
References
Selected Bibliography
Acknowledgements
Photo Acknowledgements
Index
Geraldine A. Johnson is Associate Professor in the History of Art at the University of Oxford and Fellow of Christ Church, Oxford. She is the editor of Art History Now: Objects, Concepts, Approaches (2026) and co-editor of Photo Archives and the Place of Photography (2025).