Gussie Moran (Tennis)
Harold Eugene Edgerton, American, 1903 - 1990
1949
Gelatin silver print
Image: 17 3/4 × 14 1/2 in. (45.1 × 36.8 cm)
Image: 17 3/4 × 14 1/2 in. (45.1 × 36.8 cm)
Sheet: 19 7/8 × 16 in. (50.5 × 40.6 cm)
Sheet: 19 13/16 × 15 15/16 in. (50.4 × 40.5 cm)
Hood Museum of Art, Dartmouth: Gift of Barbara and Robert Levine, Class of 1954, Tuck 1955
PH.997.55.5
Geography
Place Made: United States, North America
Period
20th century
Object Name
Photograph
Research Area
Photograph
Not on view
Inscriptions
Signed, on reverse, in graphite, lower center: HAROLD EDGERTON
Label
Though once an elite tennis player on the world stage, Gertrude “Gussie” Moran is remembered less for her athletic ability than for the lace-trimmed panties that were visible under her short skirt during the 1949 Wimbledon tournament. Tennis elites accused Moran of bringing vulgarity and sin into the sport, while the popular media celebrated her as a sex symbol rather than an accomplished athlete. Moran would garner the nickname “Gorgeous Gussie,” and photographers would often splay on the ground to catch low shots of Moran’s undergarments as she played. Rather than taking this vantage point, Edgerton focuses his photograph on Moran’s athletic prowess by drawing our attention to her tennis racket moving through space. Taken only sixty-three years after Lawn Tennis, this photograph indicates the tremendous changes undergone by female athletics (and sportswear) in the first half of the 20th century.
Thinking of Gussie Moran’s story, how do you find femininity to be framed within the realm of athletics? What has changed? What hasn’t?
From the 2024 exhibition, A Space for Dialogue 117, Sports Culture: Gender, Belonging, and Nationhood, Madyson Buchalski '24, Conroy Intern
Course History
SART 29, Photography I, Christina Seely, Winter 2015
Exhibition History
A Space for Dialogue 117, Sports Culture: Gender, Belonging, and Nationhood, Madyson Buchalski '24, Conroy Intern, Alvin P. Gutman Gallery, Hood Museum of Art, Dartmouth College, Hanover, New Hampshire, March 9 - May 5, 2024
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