Like Alfred Stieglitz in this respect, she moved organically from one mode of taking pictures to the other.
Here the values and language of fine art were employed (soft focus and painterly qualities), not for the purpose to have the work recognized, but more to experiment with the parameters of fixed identity. Women veiled and dressed as Madonnas featured in a similar mode to pictures by Julia Margaret Cameron, as well as in work by her direct influence, Gertrude Kasebier. Cunningham also experimented with Pictorialism, taking elaborately staged portraits that suggested the presence of spiritual forces, that which the eye could not see without help of the camera.
Both photographers were drawn to the phenomenal detail within a plant's natural structure and in turn successfully represented such in their imagery. Blossfeldt famously wrote the seminal work, Art Forms in Nature (1928). Cunningham wrote two academic papers early in her career and in this sense, had much in common with the German photographer, Karl Blossfeldt. Cunningham was true to specifications of the medium of photography, for at the outset of its invention one of its primary uses was as a scientific tool to document botanical specimens.This is a career dedicated to getting to the heart of things, to living at the intense centre of the swirl, and to accepting that the swirl always keeps turning, taking Cunningham on a journey through science, art, and social concern, and all the way back again. In later life, Cunningham had a sojourn in Street Photography, and all the while oscillated back to old interests as well as trying her hand at new ones. She further explored her love of plants using the techniques of Straight Photography having made lifelong friendships with the likes of Ansel Adams and Edward Western. Starting with total immersion into academic and highly scientific experimentation, Cunningham then moved fashionably to explore theatrical portraiture and Pictorialism. Cunningham's work as a photographer insightfully spans an entire century, moving through all developments in Modern Photography. Whether presenting the sensual human body or the interior stamen of a flower, the overall message is not that of sex for the sake of shocking the viewer, but rather to acknowledge the sensual and energetic pulse that runs through all of life, a similar intention to that of her contemporary, Georgia O'Keefe. Be the subject her naked lover or a botanical succulent, Imogen Cunningham made juicy photographs.
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