Modernist photographer and filmmaker Ralph Steiner (1899-1986) remains best known for his lyrical, crisp compositions that celebrate the formal beauty of mechanical, architectural, and mass-produced subjects. His photographs transformed everyday objects like a typewriter, car, or rocking chair into a stunning series of textures and geometric shapes.

Born in Cleveland, Steiner developed an interest in photography while studying chemical engineering at Dartmouth College. After graduating in 1921, he almost immediately enrolled at Clarence White's New York photography school (1921-22). Through his studies, Steiner met many leading photographers, including Margaret Bourke-White (1904-1971), Alfred Stieglitz (1864-1946), and Paul Strand (1890-1976), whose Modernist emphasis on sharp focus and formal compositions greatly impacted Steiner's approach.

In the late 1920s, Steiner also began making experimental films, including his poetic investigations of water's properties (H2O, 1929) and machine parts (Mechanical Principles, 1930). During the 1930s, Steiner joined several influential left-leaning arts groups in New York, including Group Theater and the Workers' Film and Photo League. His later cinematography for Depression-era documentary films like Pare Lorentz's The Plow that Broke the Plains (1936) and Willard Van Dyke's The City (1939) reflected this growing sensitivity to social issues. Steiner subsequently worked in Hollywood for five years before returning to the east coast to resume his work as an editorial photographer.

Steiner relocated to Vermont in 1963 to focus on his photography and cinematography. After making three more films, he devoted the next 20 years to photographing clouds and coastal skyscapes, primarily on the Maine coast and in Oaxaca, Mexico. Shortly before he died in 1986, Steiner published this work as In Pursuit of Clouds (1985).

Dartmouth College Museum and Galleries organized a retrospective in 1979, and exhibitions of Steiner's work continue, most recently, Ralph Steiner: The City at the Haggerty Museum of Art, Marquette University (2019). Today, Steiner's work is in numerous museum collections including the Tate Britain, London; Museum of Modern Art, New York; Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles; San Francisco Museum of Modern Art; Art Institute of Chicago; and Cleveland Museum of Art.