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Milk Drop Coronet

A work made of dye imbibition print.

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  • A work made of dye imbibition print.

Date:

1957

Artist:

Harold Eugene Edgerton
American, 1903–1990

About this artwork

As a professor in Electrical Engineering at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dr. Harold Edgerton often claimed his photographic work was only an incidental result of scientific experimentation. Edgerton invented modern stroboscopic photography, which utilizes a rapid succession of light flashes in order to capture a quickly moving object. His graphic images—a bullet piercing a playing card, a football being kicked, a golfer’s swing—gained popular acclaim as well, and were featured often in Life magazine throughout the 1940s. Edgerton began trying to photograph drops of milk in 1932, and in 1936 produced an image almost identical to the one here, but in black and white, of two milk drops colliding in a crown-like splash. He must have had an aesthetic as well as a scientific goal in mind, for he continued to experiment with this subject for two decades until he finally achieved visual clarity in vivid color.

Status

Currently Off View

Department

Photography and Media

Artist

Harold Eugene Edgerton

Title

Milk Drop Coronet

Place

United States (Artist's nationality:)

Date  Dates are not always precisely known, but the Art Institute strives to present this information as consistently and legibly as possible. Dates may be represented as a range that spans decades, centuries, dynasties, or periods and may include qualifiers such as c. (circa) or BCE.

Made 1957

Medium

Dye imbibition print

Dimensions

Image: 46.7 × 33.9 cm (18 7/16 × 13 3/8 in.); Paper: 50.7 × 40.4 cm (20 × 15 15/16 in.)

Credit Line

Gift of Boardroom, Inc.

Reference Number

1992.663

Extended information about this artwork

Object information is a work in progress and may be updated as new research findings emerge. To help improve this record, please email . Information about image downloads and licensing is available here.

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