LIFE Magazine and the Power of Photography

Life Magazine and the Power of Photography has been organized by the Princeton University Art Museum and the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. You can watch talks from the opening celebration on this site, or click through to their interactive digital module. Here you can view each photo story featured in the exhibition as it was published on the pages of Life, as well as the cover for that week's issue and the paid advertisements adjacent to many of the stories. Begin by clicking on a thumbnail labeled with the story’s original publication date, such as August 9, 1943, for Margaret Bourke-White's "Women in Steel" or June 16, 1961, for Gordon Parks's "Freedom’s Fearful Foe: Poverty,” and then zoom in and out to study specific photographs and read captions. You can turn the pages to see the story develop over multiple spreads, the same way it was presented to Life's readers.

Contributed by Sarah Miller