the Library of Congress in 1952 to continue photograph-
ing antebellum southern architecture. Named an Associ-
ate of Research at the University of Louisville, Louisville,
Kentucky, 1968. Awarded an honorary doctor of humane
letters by Tulane University, New Orleans, Louisiana,- Died in New Orleans, Louisiana, 2 January 1985.
Individual Exhibitions
1936 Photographs by Clarence John Laughlin; Isaac Delgado
Museum of Art, New Orleans, Louisiana
1940 Photographs by Clarence John Laughlin, Series I:
Images of the Lost, Series II Poems of Desolation; Julien
Levy Gallery, New York, New York
1946 The Camera as a Third Eye; Philadelphia Museum of
Art, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
1948 Ghosts Along the Mississippi; Phillips Gallery, Washing-
ton, D.C.
1968 Clarence John Laughlin, Photographs of Victorian
Chicago; The Corcoran Gallery of Art, Washington,
D.C.
1973 Clarence John Laughlin: The Personal Eye; Philadel-
phia Art Museum, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
1976 The Transforming Eye; International Center of Photo-
graphy, New York, New York
1980 An Exhibition of Selected Photographs of Historic
Louisiana Architecture by Clarence John Laughlin;
Jacob Aron Room Special Collections Division, Ho-
ward-Tilton Library, Tulane University, New Orleans,
Louisiana
1985 Other Ghosts Along the Mississippi; The Historic New
Orleans Collection, New Orleans, Louisiana
1985 Clarence John Laughlin; Robert Miller Gallery, New
York, New York
1991 Clarence John Laughlin: Visionary Photographer; Nel-
son-Atkins Museum, Kansas City, Missouri
1997 Haunter of Ruins: The Photographs of Clarence John
Laughlin; The Historic New Orleans Collection, New
Orleans, Louisiana
Group Exhibitions
1950 Photography Mid Century; Los Angeles County
Museum of Art, Los Angeles, California
1980 Southern Eye Southern Mind; A Photographic Inquiry;
Pink Palace Museum, Memphis, Tennessee
1982 Edward Weston and Clarence Laughlin: An Introduc-
tion to the Third World of Photography; New Orleans
Museum of Art, New Orleans, Louisiana
1983 Subjective Vision: The Lucinda W. Bunnen Collection of
Photographs; The High Museum of Art, Atlanta, Georgia
1984 A Century of Vision: Louisiana Photography 1884–
1984 ; University Art Museum, University of Southwes-
tern Louisiana, Lafayette, Louisiana
Selected Works
Birds in Hyperspace, 1935
Self-Portrait of the Photographer as Joshua, 1939
Elegy for Moss Land, 1940
The Unending Stream, 1941
The House of Hysteria, 1941
The Masks Grow to Us, 1947
Receding Rectangles, 1947
The Language of Light #3, 1952
The Improbable Dome, 1964Further Reading
Coleman,A.D.TheLucindaW.BunnenCollection,Subjective
VisioninPhotography.Atlanta,GA:TheHighMuseumof
Art, 1983.
Davis, Keith, with Nancy C. Barrett and John H. Lawr-
ence.Clarence John Laughlin: Visionary Photographer.
Kansas City, MO: Hallmark Cards, Inc., 1990.
Laughlin, Clarence John, and David Cohn.New Orleans and
Its Living Past. Boston: Houghton-Mifflin Company,
1941.
Laughlin, Clarence John.Ghosts Along the Mississippi. New
York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1948.
Laughlin, Clarence John, and E. John Bullard.Edward
Weston and Clarence John Laughlin: An Introduction to
the Third World of Photography. New Orleans, LA: The
New Orleans Museum of Art, 1982.
Lawrence, John, and Patricia Brady, eds.Haunter of Ruins:
The Photography of Clarence John Laughlin. Boston:
Bulfinch Press, 1997.
Leighten, Patricia. ‘‘Clarence John Laughlin: The Art and
Thought of an American Surrealist.’’History of Photo-
graphy145 (April–June 1988).
Williams, Jonathan.Clarence John Laughlin: The Personal
Eye. Millerton, NY: Aperture, 1973.LAUGHLIN, CLARENCE JOHNClarence John Laughlin, Old Grocery Store
in New Orleans.
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