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Dorothea Lange-
The Oakland Museum of California is undergoing a major renovation and reinstallation project. During this time our Natural Science Gallery and selected temporary exhibitions will remain open while the Art and History Permanent galleries will be closed. In addition, many of our services will be limited.

Due to staffing limitations during our renovation, our Rights and Reproductions services will be restricted between now and the end of 2009. We will be unable to accommodate requests that require new photography or research. We will review requests for existing imagery on a case by case basis. The average turn around time for Rights and Reproductions will be a minimum of 12 weeks.

We apologize for any inconvenience this may cause. Thanks you for your understanding during this very busy time.

"You put your camera around your neck along with putting on your shoes, and there it is, an appendage of the body that shares your life with you. The camera is an instrument that teaches people how to see without a camera." - Dorothea Lange

The insightful and compassionate photographs of Dorothea Lange (1895 - 1965) have exerted a profound influence on the development of modern documentary photography. Lange's concern for people, her appreciation of the ordinary, and the striking empathy she showed for her subjects make her unique among photographers of her day.

Demonstration Sign, San Francisco, 1934

The Art Department of the Oakland Museum of California holds the largest and most comprehensive collection of the work of Dorothea Lange, representing every facet of a long and varied career. Beginning as a commercial portrait photographer in 1920s San Francisco, Lange's early documentary work included images of Native Americans, made on travels to the Southwest with her first husband, painter Maynard Dixon. By the early 1930s, studio work seemed limited and static to Lange; almost intuitively, she took her camera to the streets, to the breadlines, waterfront strikes, and down-and-out people of Depression-era San Francisco.

In 1935 Lange began her landmark work for the California and Federal Resettlement Administrations (later the Farm Security Administration).

Collaborating with her second husband, labor economist Paul Schuster Taylor, she documented the troubled exodus of farm families escaping the dust bowl as they migrated West in search of work. Lange's documentary style achieved its fullest expression in these year, with photographs such as "Migrant Mother" becoming instantly recognized symbols of the migrant experience. Coupled with Taylor's essays and captions, her photographs were hailed as persuasive evidence of the urgent need for government programs to assist disadvantaged Americans.

	Dorothea Lange Slide Show
	Lange Archive

Although the coming of World War II brought an end to Lange's FSA work, the war opened a new chapter in her life as a photographer. During the War Lange documented the forced relocation of Japanese American citizens to internment camps; recorded the efforts of women and minority workers in wartime industries at California shipyards; and covered the founding of the United Nations in San Francisco. Only illness prevented her from completing a 1940 Simon Guggenheim Foundation grant to travel the country photographing the American people.

This dedication and compassion drove Lange even during the final years of her life. In the 1950s and 60s she produced vivid photographic essays on Ireland, Asia. Egypt, midwestern utopian communities, and the post-war industrial scene of the Bay Area.

Dorothea Lange died in 1965. The following year her unique collection became a gift to the Oakland Museum of California from her husband, Paul Schuster Taylor. The collection includes Lange's personal negative file of more than 25,000 images, over 6000 vintage prints, and a selection from Lange's personal papers and library.

View the Oakland Museum of California's entire Dorothea Lange photonegative collection online at http://www.oac.cdlib.org:80/dynaweb/ead/omca/ ! As a member of the Museums in the Online Archive of California (MOAC), funded by the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS), the Oakland Museum of California is in the process of posting its entire collection of 25,000+ Dorothea Lange photonegatives onto the California Digital Library. Visit this site often to learn more about the artist and her work and to watch this online collection grow.

Long utilized by researchers, most recently in the books Dorothea Lange: A Visual Life, Photographing The Second Gold Rush: Dorothea Lange and the Bay Area at War, 1941-1945, and Dorothea Lange's Ireland, the archive is impressive in its depth and breadth. All of these books are available in the Museum Store.

For information on Lange rights and reproductions, contact Rights and Reproductions at 510/238-3442; Fax at 510/238-6925.

For more photography at OMCA visit our photography resource page.