Photographs from the Polaroid Collection, 10 June 2025 < Auctions

Rago, Wright, and LAMA are proud to offer works from the institutional collection of legendary camera maker Polaroid, celebrating the company's outsized impact on art and visual culture and its historic encouragement of artistic experimentation.

Photographs from the Polaroid Collection on June 10th presents a wide range of works from defining artists who were invited by Polaroid to use their cameras and film—among them David Hockney, Timothy Greenfield-Sanders, Sarah Moon, Chuck Close, Lorna Simpson, Dawoud Bey, Robert Rauschenberg, and many more. Highlights from the collection include Hockney's Polacolor print Interior, Pembroke Studios, London, Greenfield-Sanders's 1990 Polacolor portrait of Jeff Koons, and Moon’s 1997 pigment print (shot with Polaroid Type 669 Polacolor film) Stockings.

Together, these works capture the spirit of creative freedom that Polaroid championed for decades, showcasing the tandem evolutions of photographic technology, fine art, and visual culture.

Auction / Lambertville
10 June 2025 11 am eastern

Select Preview / New York
22 April – 8 May 2025
11 am – 5 pm, Mon – Fri
501 West 20th Street

Preview / Lambertville
3 – 10 June 2025
11 am – 4 pm, Mon – Fri
or by appointment

Additional Information
info@ragoarts.com
609 397 9374

After David Hockney Interior, Pembroke Studios, London $8,000–12,000, Sarah Moon Stockings $12,000–18,000

Ellen Carey

Pulls (CMY)

estimate: $4,000–6,000

current bid: $1,100 5 bids

Patrick Nagatani and Andrée Tracey

Red Piece

estimate: $500–700

current bid: $550 5 bids

Barbara Kasten

Construct NYC 8

estimate: $1,500–2,000

current bid: $550 8 bids

John Divola

Untitled

estimate: $1,000–1,500

current bid: $550 6 bids

William Wegman Untitled $2,500–3,500, Richard Hamilton Untitled $7,000–9,000, Masahisa Fukase A Game: Lips and Needles $2,000–3,000

Robert Cumming

Easy Analogy

estimate: $2,000–3,000

current bid: $450 6 bids

Robert Rauschenberg

Francis

estimate: $3,000–5,000

current bid: $1,200 11 bids

Philippe Halsman

Louis Armstrong

estimate: $800–1,200

current bid: $500 5 bids

Beloved by popular audiences and embraced by a wide swath of artists, Polaroid technology revolutionized photography and was “the Apple of its day,” according to Smithsonian Magazine. Beginning in the 1940s, Polaroid inventor and founder Edwin Land invited notable artists to test the company's cameras and films by creating new works—directly supporting artistic experimentation and weaving artists into the evolution of photographic technology. Many of the works that resulted from this mutually beneficial arrangement became part of the Polaroid Collection. In 1949, Land invited Ansel Adams to help oversee the collection and Adams would remain involved for more than three decades.