The Schneider/Erdman Printer's Proof Collection

The Schneider/Erdman Printer’s Proof Collection is among the Harvard Art Museums’ most significant holdings in photography, comprising nearly 450 photographs printed over the course of three decades by Gary Schneider. Founded by Schneider and his partner, John Erdman, in 1981, Schneider/Erdman, Inc., came to serve as a creative and cooperative space for artists, photojournalists, and fashion photographers who visited the Manhattan-based photo lab throughout the 1980s and ’90s. While Schneider labored in the darkroom, Erdman managed the lab’s clients and business operations. Together they amassed this collection of pristine prints. Created during a period marked by the AIDS crisis, America’s culture wars, and the struggle to locate photography’s place in the art world, the printer’s proofs chronicle the trajectory of both a failing industry and a burgeoning field.