Shells, the wondrous forms of the sea

Doctor J.B. Polak lived a stone’s throw away from the Rijksmuseum. He worked in Amsterdam at the Binnengasthuis as an assistant in electrology and radiology. No doubt at the insistence of the dynamic chief editor H.Th. Wijdeveld, he took the X-radiographs for the famous shell issue of Wendingen. Polak quickly made a name for himself in the art world. László Moholy-Nagy included one of his photographs in his controversial Bauhaus book Malerei Photographie Film (Painting, Photography, Film) (1925) and Lissitzky also published the work.