Man Ray (American, 1890-1976) Wooden Hand with Engine Valve and Spring, circa 1926-1930 Gelatin silver print, printed 1929-1930 6-3/8 x 8-3/4 inches (16.2 x 22.2 cm) (image/sheet) Photographer's third rue Campagne Première stamp (M4), annotated in pencil '2 eme' and reproduction notation '23,5' in pencil, verso. Property from the Estate of Lewis Lehr LITERATURE: Julien Levy Gallery, Modern European Photography, exhibition catalogue, New York, February 20-March 11, 1932 (as Mannequin Hand Holding Corkscrew); J. Levy, Surrealism, Black Sun Press, 1936, p. 62, fig. 5.; Witkin Gallery, Photographs from the Julien Levy Collection, exhibition catalogue, New York, October 12-November 12, 1977, p. 25; K. Ware and P. Barberie, Dreaming in Black and White, Photography at the Julien Levy Gallery, Philadelphia Museum of Art, 2006, p. 62. Where Lewis Lehr acquired this photograph is unknown, but as a pioneering photography dealer, by the mid-1970s he was participating in the early London photography auctions and the New York Photographic Historical Society fairs. Presently only one other print and a copy of that print have been located, both formerly in the possession of the influential gallerist Julien Levy. Significantly, there are no auction sales records for this image in the last 30 years. Julien Levy exhibited a signed print at his gallery in the exhibition Modern European Photography which ran from February 20 to March 11, 1932 where it was titled Mannequin Hand Holding Corkscrew. Levy must have considered this an important photograph since it is one of only 5 works reproduced in the Photography chapter of his 1936 landmark book Surrealism. The others were one Atget, two Cartier-Bressons, and one Hans Bellmer. This print appears again in the 1977 Witkin Gallery catalogue Photographs from The Julien Levy Collection. The whereabouts of this signed print is unknown. A copy print of this photograph is in the collection of the Philadelphia Museum of Art. When this image has been reproduced it has been incorrectly titled as Mannequin Hand Holding Corkscrew, Dummy Hand and Spring, or Wooden Hand with Piston. The object in the carved wooden hand is actually an engine intake valve or exhaust valve and spring. This combination of man and machine was assembled by Man Ray for the photograph, and the original objects have long since disappeared. He could have made this image as early as 1926 when he was photographing similar assemblages. The original glass negative is in the collection of The Centre Pompidou. By 1930, Man Ray had transitioned from using fragile glass plates to more flexible and less expensive film negatives. This object reappears, now in a bright red hue, in the foreground of Man Ray's painting Le Logis de l'artiste (The Artist's Home), circa 1930-34, with Lee Miller's vulnerable neck in the background and the head of a cello similar to the one Man Ray used in his 1926 film Emak Bakia. Lee Miller's second husband, Roland Penrose, purchased the painting from someone who acquired it from Man Ray and it hung in the Penrose living room. We would like to thank Andrew Strauss of the Man Ray Expertise Committee and Denise Bethel, former Chairman, Photographs, Americas at Sotheby's New York for their valuable contributions in the research of this photograph. HID03101062020 © 2020 Heritage Auctions | All Rights Reserved