Contemporary reception of New Documents [MoMA, 1967] — Deschin and press coverage
Citation
Deschin, Jacob. [Review of New Documents, Museum of Modern Art, New York.] The New York Times, 1967. [Exact date, section, and page NOT confirmed this session.]
Tier justification
Tier 3: New York Times review by a named author. Jacob Deschin was the NYT’s photography critic throughout the 1950s–1960s (confirmed: his authorship of a skeptical review of New Documents is recorded in Wikipedia’s New Documents article, fetched 2026-05-17). The review text was not accessed in this session (NYT is blocked to this worker); this entry records the confirmed fact of his skeptical reception as reported in Wikipedia.
Relevance
New Documents (28 February – 7 May 1967, MoMA, New York) was the second major Szarkowski-era exhibition after The Photographer’s Eye and represents the most direct curatorial counter-statement to the Family of Man humanist register. Szarkowski’s wall text explicitly contrasts the “new generation” of photographers with the reform-minded documentary tradition: “Their aim has been not to reform life, but to know it” (Szarkowski wall text, quoted in Wikipedia New Documents article, fetched 2026-05-17). Jacob Deschin’s skeptical reception is a data point for how the critical establishment — which had enthusiastically reviewed The Family of Man in 1955 — responded to Szarkowski’s anti-rhetorical aesthetic programme.
Key excerpts / pages
Facts confirmed from sources fetched this session:
From Wikipedia “New Documents” (fetched 2026-05-17):
- Szarkowski wall text (verbatim per Wikipedia): “In the past decade a new generation of photographers has directed the documentary approach toward more personal ends. Their aim has been not to reform life, but to know it.”
- Szarkowski wall text (verbatim per Wikipedia): “What unites these three photographers is not style or sensibility; each has a distinct and personal sense of the use of photography and the meanings of the world. What is held in common is the belief that the world is worth looking at, and the courage to look at it without theorizing.”
- Jacob Deschin wrote for The New York Times and was skeptical of the exhibition (confirmed, Wikipedia New Documents, fetched 2026-05-17). No further detail — the specific date, headline, and quotes from Deschin’s review are NOT confirmed this session.
- Wikipedia records: the work was “considered radical at the time” and “out of step with the times,” yet all three photographers “eventually became recognized among the leading talents of their generation.”
Exhibition facts (confirmed Wikipedia New Documents, fetched 2026-05-17):
- Exhibition dates: 28 February – 7 May 1967, MoMA, New York.
- Photographers: Diane Arbus (32 photographs), Lee Friedlander (30), Garry Winogrand (32) = 94 total B&W photographs.
- Touring: 14 institutions including Goucher College (Towson MD), McMaster University, State Univ. of New York Buffalo, Cornell University (Ithaca NY), Long Island University (Brooklyn), Dartmouth College (Hanover NH), Concordia College (River Forest IL), Wittenburg University (Springfield OH), University of Missouri (Columbia), Krannert Art Museum / University of Illinois (Champaign), Amherst College (MA), Wesleyan University (Middleton CT), University of Notre Dame (IN), San Francisco Museum of Art.
- No original catalog was produced at the time of exhibition (confirmed from
src-szarkowski-1967-new-documents, in repo). - 2017 anniversary catalog: Meister, Sarah Hermanson, ed. Arbus Friedlander Winogrand: New Documents, 1967. MoMA, 2017. ISBN 978-0-87070-955-5 (confirmed from
src-szarkowski-1967-new-documents, in repo).
Notes
- Flagged
verified: falsebecause the Deschin review text was not accessed in this session (NYT blocked). - Jacob Deschin is confirmed as NYT photography critic in the 1960s from his role in both the 1955 FoM coverage (
src-deschin-1955-nyt, in repo) and the 1967 New Documents skeptical review (Wikipedia, fetched this session). The NYT review exists but was not fetched. - Wikipedia’s New Documents article cites two secondary sources for the “radical” / “out of step” characterisation and for Szarkowski’s wall text: Gefter, Philip. “John Szarkowski, Curator of Photography, Dies at 81.” New York Times, 9 July 2007; and Mora, Gilles. The Last Photographic Heroes. Abrams, 2007. Neither was accessed in this session.
- For the broader historiographical context, see
src-szarkowski-1967-new-documents(in repo) and the perspective note there. - Cross-references:
src-szarkowski-1967-new-documents,src-szarkowski-1966-photographers-eye-book,src-deschin-1955-nyt,src-sekula-1981.
Open questions
- Exact date, section, and page of Deschin’s NYT review: NOT confirmed (NYT blocked).
- Other NYT coverage of New Documents: NOT located.
- Artforum review of New Documents: NOT located.
- Saturday Review coverage: NOT located.
- Village Voice coverage (important for the Arbus/Winogrand/Friedlander critical history): NOT located.