Dorothea Lange, Migratory Cotton Pickers, Eloy, Arizona, 1940. Dorothea Lange: The Family Collection, Part Two.
Phillips is pleased to present the second session of Dorothea Lange: The Family Collection, a trove of 50 photographs coming directly from the descendants of this seminal American photographer. This sale follows Phillips’ first offering from the Family Collection offered in October 2022. Part Two will be open for bidding from 29 March to 5 April and coincides with Phillips’ 4 April Photographs auction in New York.
Dorothea Lange, Two Men Talking on the Street (Oakland or Richmond, California), 1942. Dorothea Lange: The Family Collection, Part Two.
The sale features some of Lange’s most indelible images from her multi-decade career in photography, as well as many images which will be new to collectors. All were in the photographer’s collection at the time of her death, passed along to her descendants, and represent the entirety of her career — from the first images she made outside her portrait studio in San Francisco, through her work for the Farm Security Administration during the Depression, to her post-war documentary projects — much of it done in the company of her husband and collaborator Paul Taylor.
Dorothea Lange, White Angel Breadline, San Francisco, 1933. Dorothea Lange: The Family Collection, Part Two.
Documenting America
Born in Hoboken, New Jersey, in 1895, Dorothea Lange learned to photograph as a young woman before her departure for the west coast in 1918. Talented and ambitious, Lange opened a portrait studio that catered to San Francisco’s upper crust. After witnessing first-hand the social upheaval caused by the Depression, she took to the streets with her camera, taking images of labor demonstrations, the newly unemployed, and men, women, and children who were without home or income — images that would set the trajectory for the rest of her career.
Dorothea Lange, Women Workers, Richmond Shipyard, 1943. Dorothea Lange: The Family Collection, Part Two.
During the Depression, she traveled the country under the auspices of the Farm Security Administration, documenting the poverty endured by Americans and creating some of the most indelible and culturally relevant images of the 20th century. She brought her incisive and empathetic documentary style to a variety of national and international subjects during and after World War II. Lange was witness to a world in transition and her camera captured it all. Her photographs show that the story of the 20th century is the story of individuals.
Highlights of the April offering include a print of one of Lange’s earliest and most decisive documentary images, White Angel Breadline, whose central figure embodies the poverty of the Depression and the grit to overcome it. Additionally, Each print in the sale bears a Family Collection stamp on the reverse.
Dorothea Lange in Texas on the Plains Circa 1935. Photo: Dorothea Lange / The Dorothea Lange Collection, the Oakland Museum of California.
Dorothea Lange, Paul Taylor, and their Family, 1960s.
Discover More from Dorothea Lange: The Family Collection, Part Two >
Online Auction /
29 March 2023 – 5 April 2023
Opening 12:00 pm EDT 29 March 2023
Closing 12:00 pm EDT 5 April 2023
Recommended Reading
New York as You've Never Seen It >
The Look, Très Chic, The Wife and Her Lover: On one of Irving Penn’s greatest masterpieces >
A Legend’s Rise: Peter C. Bunnell >
The Start of a Brilliant Career >