Minor White
1975
Image not available — this artwork is under copyright
View on museum website →Medium
offset lithograph
Dimensions
image: 8 × 5.5 cm (3 1/8 × 2 3/16 in.) sheet: 8.9 × 6.3 cm (3 1/2 × 2 1/2 in.)
Classification
Photograph
Department
CPH
Museum
National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.
Credit
Gift of Sarah Greenough
Accession Number
2015.173.78
Art Historical Context
In 1975, conceptual artist Mike Mandel created *Minor White*, an offset lithograph playfully nods to the revered American photographer Minor White (1908–6). Part of Mandel's iconic *Baseball-Photographer Cards* series, thisutive work (just 8 × 5.5 cm) reimagines photography luminaries as baseball players, blending sports memorabilia culture with fine art. Produced in an edition mimicking mass-market trading cards, it uses offset lithography—a precise, affordable printing technique—to evoke collectibility and fandom. Minor White, a pioneer of straight photography and the Zone System, influence...
About the Artist
Mike Mandel
Mike Mandel, born in 1950 in Los Angeles and raised in the burgeoning San Fernando Valley amid freeways, billboards, and strip malls, drew early inspiration from this media-saturated landscape. He earned a BA in Philosophy from California State University, Northridge in 1972 before pursuing an MFA in Photography at the San Francisco Art Institute in 1974, where he met lifelong collaborator Larry S...