Schadographs

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. Images produced without a camera by laying objects on light-sensitive paper and exposing them to light, a technique linked to the artist Christian Schad
2. Photographic prints made directly from objects arranged on sensitized paper, with no lens involved in forming the picture
3. Cameraless pictures created by placing items on treated photographic paper so their shadows register when light falls on the surface

Etymology: Christian Schad, a German painter associated with the Dada movement in Zurich, made images by laying objects directly on light-sensitive paper and exposing it to light, with no camera involved. He named the results after himself: "Schadographie" in German, with the "-graph" element from Greek "graphein," "to write" or "to draw." The English plural "schadographs" refers to these pictures. Schad's technique is a photogram, and the same method was later used by Man Ray and László Moholy-Nagy, who called their versions "rayographs." Schad's name survives mainly in art-historical writing, where it marks his place in the early history of this technique.

Synonyms: photogram