Man Ray was an American artist who spent most of his career in Paris, France. He has been described as a modernist, and a contributor to both the Dada and Surrealist movements.

Le violin de Ingres can be viewed as the Mother of All Photo-shopped Images. Altering photographs was nothing new when Man Ray created this image in 1924. Photographers had been retouching photos ever since Niépce and Daguerre invented the medium in the early 1800s. An early test of the “art” in photography was evidence of the photo-maker’s hand in the print, as it still is today. It was understood to be a talent of the hand, known to photographers but not to the public at large. What was so contemporary about Man Ray’s work was the obvious irony of his manipulation.