American Modern examines the practice of documentary photography through the work of three of the most important photographers of the 1930s—Berenice Abbott, Walker Evans, and Margaret Bourke-White. Although they were not the decade’s only documentary photographers, each contributed a fundamental, independent, and novel idea about documentary to the common pool of artistic practice: for Abbott, it was the notion that photography was a means of critical dialogue and communication; Evans thoroughly investigated the idea that photography has a unique and essential relationship to time; and Bourke-White developed a repertoire wherein documentary could fuse the logic and pageantry of modern industry with the drama and individual narratives of its subjects. Together, the careers of Abbott, Evans, and Bourke-White chronicle the fortunes of the medium during this important decade.