In 1954, inspired by Conrad N. Arensberg’s book, Irish Countryman, Dorothea Lange pitched a story to the editors of LIFE magazine that would focus on Irish country life. LIFE liked Lange’s idea and sent her and her son and writing partner Daniel Dixon to County Clare where they stayed for a month; Lange photographed assiduously during this time, while Dixon conducted interviews. Ultimately editorial constraints relegated the story to only nine pages in the 21 March 1955 issue, and Dixon’s text, which had been heavily edited by the magazine, was uncredited. While only a small fraction of Lange’s Irish photographs saw publication, her pictures from this trip comprise a valuable record of life in the Irish countryside that, in subsequent years, would disappear.
The photographs in Dorothea Lange: The Family Collection, Part Two were in the photographer’s collection at the time of her death and thenceforth passed to her descendants. The images represent the entirety of Lange’s career as one of the foremost documentary photographers of the 20th century, from work made before her engagement with the Resettlement Administration, later the Farm Security Administration, in the 1930s, to the travel photography that absorbed her in her final years, as well as more personal images of her family. Each print bears a Family Collection stamp on the reverse.