"Harry was very seldom without a camera," Mrs. Callahan has said. And she — near at hand, accommodating, familiar ("I couldn't photograph a model because that seemed artificial to me," Callahan said) — seems to have been a convenient prop. This sensation is most prominent in a series of outdoor shots in which Eleanor and Barbara become tiny figures in the distance, dwarfed by the surrounding trees, shoreline, or a museum façade. They seem positioned simply as tiny compositional counterpoints to the land and architecture.
The end of the Eleanor series coincides with Callahan's move to RISD. "It was hard in the beginning because photography wasn't accepted at all," he said. And it coincides with Barbara, around age 9 or 10, growing antsy with posing, of holding still while her father slowly set things up.
"I worked on the nudes from the 1940s through the '60s," Callahan said in the '70s. "But then our lives changed and Eleanor went back to work, and that was that."
Related:
A Visual Buffet, Summer buffet, Worth another look, More 
- A Visual Buffet
The RISD Museum offers work by more than 175 staffers in its "RISD Biennial Faculty Exhibition 2009."
- Summer buffet
"Nature/Artifice" at the RISD Museum (224 Benefit Street, Providence, through February 2010) feels summery, but it's not like lite beach reading. I think it has to do with the one-room show's crisp, fresh feel and the platform full of flip-flops.
- Worth another look
In 2008, real estate and jobs dominated local art news.
- Take a look
A year ago the future looked bright as the RISD Museum debuted its shiny new Chace Center.
- Lows, highs, and middles
Yousuf Karsh is one of the giants of portrait photography.
- One shining moment
Fairhaven won a tight race at the 2009 WBRU Rock Hunt Finals at Lupo's on April 4.
- The Chair Man
It is one of the icons of 20th-century design. What distinguishes Marcel Breuer's B34 armchair from 1928 is its materials (fabric seats slung between steel tubing) and the lack of rear legs.
- Slideshow: Marcel Breuer at RISD
The RISD Museum presents "Marcel Breuer: Design and Architecture," a major retrospective of the late Bauhaus designer's furniture and buildings, through July 19.
- In focus
Photography has been New England’s greatest contribution to art of the past century.
- Greatest hits
The RISD Museum continues its top to bottom renovation and expansion.
- Summer daze
One of the invigorating qualities of summer art shows in Boston is their relative playfulness. Slideshow: Images from the galleries
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Museum And Gallery
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