1915 in new york a young painter named man ray was introduced to the artist marcel duchamp but manrey spoke no french and duchamp knew little english so they played a game of tennis duchamp scandalized the art world in 1917 when he anonymously submitted an ordinary plumbing fixture to an art exhibition this was one of several everyday objects duchamp presented as art and called ready maids the two of them shared ideas and manray began experimenting making art from whatever materials were lying around his studio he had initially taken up the camera to photograph his own work but now he began making evocative pictures of ordinary objects in a sense a photographic answer to duchamp's ready mates in 1920 he photographed a kitchen mixer and an assemblage of objects from his darkroom he called these two pictures man and woman the two artists produce many works in collaboration and man ray helped duchamp create his alter ego ero celebi but duchamp returned to france and manray found himself out of sorts in 1921 he too set sail for paris there he was taken in by a group of poets artists and anarchists who admired and embraced his work in ways new york had not still in the midst of this thriving culture of creative thinkers he struggled to make a living to support himself he took up portrait photography if i'd had the nerf i'd have become a thief for a gangster since i didn't i became a photographer the writers the intellectuals and artists living in paris at that time began to seek him out to have their portraits taken once when working in the dark room he made an accidental discovery when he dropped an unexposed sheet into the developer regretting the waste of paper i mechanically placed a small glass funnel to graduate and the thermometer on the wetted paper i turned on the light before my eyes an image began to fall not quite a simple silhouette but distorted and refracted by the glass taking whatever objects came to hand my hotel room key a handkerchief some pencils a brush a candle a piece of twine i made a few more prints excitedly enjoying myself immensely they looked startlingly new and mysterious he named his new creation the rayograph he wrote triumphantly to a patron i have finally freed myself from the sticky medium of paint and am working directly with light itself for all their simplicity the radiographs powerfully evoked space and movement he orchestrated complex compositions often making multiple exposures for a single picture and coaxed mysterious shadows out of ordinary objects over the next decade he made hundreds of photos in this manner and conducted other experiments in the dark room i deliberately dodged all the rules mixed the most insane products together i committed heinous crimes against chemistry and photography man ray once said he set out to violate every rule in photography throughout the 20s and 30s he continually pushed the frontiers of the photographic medium achieving works of rare beauty and strangeness he applied his talents to portraiture fashion and advertising along the way he opened new avenues for creative photography and produced some of the most memorable and iconic pictures of his time [Music]