LIFE BEYOND FIRST CLASS
ARTS & COLLECTIBLES
THE MET
REFRAMES A LEGEND
When Objects Dream at The Met offers a powerful new reading of Man Ray’s career, positioning his enigmatic rayographs not as curiosities but as the conceptual foundation of a practice that reshaped modern art.
Man Ray (American, 1890–1976),
Self-Portrait in 31 bis rue Campagne-Première Studio,
1925, Gelatin silver print,
6 1/8 × 4 1/2 in. (15.6 × 11.4 cm),
The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, Bluff Collection, Promised Gift of John A. Pritzker Photo by Ian Reeves,
© Man Ray 2015 Trust / Artists Rights Society (ARS), NY /ADAGP, Paris 2025
To step into When Objects Dream, the new Man Ray exhibition at The Metropolitan Museum of Art, is to enter a realm where perception shifts, light plays tricks, and the boundaries between objects and imagination dissolve. This is no retrospective in the traditional sense. It is a radical rethinking of Man Ray’s legacy, one that places the camera-less photograph, the iconic rayograph, at the very center of his creative universe.
Rayographs, a term coined by Man Ray himself, are images made without a camera. Everyday objects are arranged directly onto photosensitive paper and exposed to light, producing ghostly silhouettes that defy logic yet feel instantly resonant. These were not idle experiments. They were portals. They revealed a new way of seeing that challenged the photographic orthodoxy of his time.
With more than 160 works, the exhibition brings together photographs, paintings, films, objects, and ephemera that span his early abstractions in New York, his Paris collaborations with figures like Lee Miller and Tristan Tzara, and his later explorations in Hollywood. The show emphasizes the rayograph not as a detour in his practice but as a philosophical tool that shaped everything from his portraits to his films and sculptures.
The curatorial framework, led by Stephanie D’Alessandro and Stephen C. Pinson, includes contributions from The Met’s own collection and more than 50 international lenders. It also benefits from new technical research by the now-closed Lens Media Lab at Yale. A highlight is the inclusion of 35 pieces from a promised gift by collector John Pritzker, whose interest in Dada and Surrealism has helped reshape institutional holdings around these movements.
CLOCKWISE FROM TOP LEFT:
Man Ray (American, 1890–1976)
Rayograph, 1922
Gelatin silver print, 9 1/2 × 7 in. (24.1 × 17.8 cm)
The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, Bluff
Collection, Promised Gift of John A. Pritzker
Photo by Ben Blackwell
© Man Ray 2015 Trust / Artists Rights Society
(ARS), NY / ADAGP, Paris 2025
Man Ray (American, 1890–1976)
Rayograph, 1922
Gelatin silver print, 9 3/8 × 7 in. (23.8 × 17.8 cm)
The J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles (84.XM.1000.173)
Courtesy The J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles
© Man Ray 2015 Trust / Artists Rights Society
(ARS), NY / ADAGP, Paris 2025
Man Ray (American, 1890–1976)
ANPOR, 1919
Gouache, ink, and colored pencils on paper
15 1/2 × 11 1/2 in. (39.4 × 29.2 cm)
Collection of Gale and Ira Drukier
Image © The Metropolitan Museum of Art, photo by Bruce Schwarz
Man Ray: When Objects Dream
Venue: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Gallery 199
Dates: On view through February 1, 2026
Info: metmuseum.org/exhibitions/man-ray-when-objects-dream
From Top:
Man Ray (American, 1890–1976)
Paysage suédois (Swedish Landscape), 1926
Oil on canvas, 18 × 25 1/2 in. (45.7 × 64.8 cm)
The Mayor Gallery, London
Photo courtesy of The Mayor Gallery, London
© Man Ray 2015 Trust / Artists Rights Society (ARS),
NY / ADAGP, Paris 2025
Man Ray (American, 1890–1976)
Marine, ca. 1925
Gelatin silver print, 8 3/4 × 11 9/16 in. (22.2 × 29.3 cm)
Private collection; courtesy Galerie 1900–2000,
Paris–New York
© Man Ray 2015 Trust / Artists Rights a(ARS),
NY / ADAGP, Paris 2025
_1926.jpg)
The show is organized thematically rather than chronologically, guiding visitors through sections such as “Silhouette,” “Dream,” “Game,” and “The Studio.” This structure echoes Man Ray’s own refusal to adhere to rigid categories. His aerographs, for instance, created by spraying paint over objects, blur the lines between painting and photography. His films (including Retour à la raison, Emak Bakia, and L’étoile de mer) are screened in newly restored 4K versions and evoke his fascination with rhythm, chance, and the subconscious.
Alongside famous pieces like Le Violon d’Ingres, Cadeau, and Object to be Destroyed, visitors encounter rare early abstractions, photographic experiments, and even fashion commissions. What emerges is not just the portrait of an artist, but a portrait of an era seen through one of its most enigmatic figures. Man Ray transformed ordinary materials into visual riddles. He made photographs that felt like dreams and objects that behaved like provocations.
The exhibition is also supported by The Met’s new Bluff Collaborative for Research on Dada and Surrealism, funded by the Pritzker Family Fund. Live programming surrounding the show includes a musical score by SQÜRL ( Jim Jarmusch and Carter Logan), a performance by choreographer Trajal Harrell, and a lecture by artist Alex Da Corte, who channels the spirit of Marcel Duchamp. These events expand the exhibition beyond its physical walls and into the city’s wider cultural consciousness.
More than anything, When Objects Dream reminds us that Man Ray never asked photography to be truthful. He asked it to be magical. He embraced the accident, the trace, the unseen imprint. In his hands, an image was never just a document. It was a metaphysical proposition.
At a time when the art world sought clarity and definition, Man Ray insisted on mystery. That insistence continues to resonate.
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