Ray Johnson at Black Mountain College

As a student at North Carolina’s Black Mountain College from 1945 to 1948, Johnson thrived under the rigorous tutelage of his foundation-course teacher Josef Albers (1888–1976). Johnson also modeled for Archer, a fellow student who would go on to teach photography at the school. This portrait—lush, faceless, and sexually ambiguous—foreshadows the complexity of Johnson’s use of photography throughout his career. Though attracted by the camera’s peerless ability to bestow glamour, he often tried to undercut its role as a transparent conveyor of facts.