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Dimensions: measurements note 7 1/2 by 9 5/8 in. (19.1 by 24.4 cm.)

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Provenance: The photographer to his sister, Mary Weston SeamanBy descent to her daughter, Jeannette Seaman

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Literature: This print:Kathy Kelsey Foley, Edward Weston's Gifts to His Sister (The Dayton Art Institute, 1978, in conjunction with the exhibition), p. 47Alexander Lee Nyerges, Edward Weston: A Photographer's Love of Life (The Dayton Art Institute, 2004, in conjunction with the exhibition), pl. 33Other prints of this image:Conger 927Beaumont Newhall, Supreme Instants: The Photographs of Edward Weston (Tucson: Center for Creative Photography, 1986, in conjunction with the exhibition), pl. 43Nancy Newhall, ed., Edward Weston: The Flame of Recognition (Aperture, 1967), p. 48Manfred Heiting, ed., Edward Weston (Köln, 2004), p. 159Judith Hochberg, Sarah Lowe, Michael Mattis, and Dody Weston Thompson, Edward Weston: Life Work (Revere, 2004), cover and pl. 63Amy Conger, Edward Weston: The Form of the Nude (London, 2005), p. 94Kurt Markus, Dune: Edward & Brett Weston (Kalispell, Montana, 2003), p. 55

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Notes: This study of Charis Wilson on the dunes of Oceano was the only photograph of a nude sent by Edward to his sister May. One of the most famous nudes from this series, the photograph shows Charis discreetly from behind, and does not reveal parts of her anatomy that are evident in other prints from the series. Charis Wilson met Mary Weston Seaman on many occasions, and admired the strong woman she was, and what she meant to her brother Edward. Charis wrote of her first impressions of May, 'I saw at once . . . she had that same inner fire and vitality that her brother possessed, the same glowing brown eyes that must have been their mother's legacy' (Through Another Lens, p. 73). This nude study was included by Weston in his exhibition at the Morgan Camera Shop in Los Angeles in 1939; his important retrospective at The Museum of Modern Art in 1946; and the World of Edward Weston show organized by the Smithsonian Institution in 1957. In addition to the print of this image in the Edward Weston Archive at the Center for Creative Photography in Tucson, Conger locates prints in the following institutions: the Museum of Modern Art, the Art Institute of Chicago, the Harrison Memorial Library in Carmel, and the National Gallery of Canada in Ottawa. There is also a Project Print at Santa Cruz.