No. 5: Bottle from the Sea

Grete Stern was commissioned to create the Dreams photomontages as photographic illustrations for a weekly column, “Psychoanalysis Will Help You,” in Idilio (Idyll), a pioneering Argentinian women’s magazine. Its readers submitted written descriptions of their dreams which were analyzed by two male intellectuals and illustrated by Stern. While incorporating some suggestions from two men, Stern often subverted their interpretations, substituting her own proto-feminist reactions to the dream narratives.

A horizontally oriented black-and-white photomontage depicts a woman with a light skin tone sitting inside a large, corked glass bottle that floats above a coastline. She sits with her knees pulled to her chest and her arms wrapped around them, looking toward the right. The background features a dark sea with waves breaking on a rocky shore beneath a sky filled with heavy, dark clouds. Soft light reflects off the bottle's glass surface.

No. 5: Bottle from the Sea

1950, printed probably 1970s

Grete Stern

(German, 1904–1999)

Argentina

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