Plate Number 400. Emptying a bucket of water

Art Historical Context

Eadweard Muybridge’s 1887 collotype “Plate Number 400. Emptying a bucket of water” belongs to his landmark “Animal Locomotion” series, in which the photographer used banks of cameras to freeze successive instants of human movement. Working at the University of Pennsylvania, Muybridge recorded ordinary actions—walking, climbing, pouring—so that scientists and artists could study the body’s mechanics for the first time. The resulting grids of images revealed phases of motion invisible to the naked eye and helped lay the groundwork for modern cinema. Printed by the collotype process, each plate preserves the crisp detail of Muybridge’s original glass negatives while allowing wide distribution. The sheet’s generous scale (roughly 18 by 24 inches) lets viewers compare subtle shifts in posture and weight as the figure tips the bucket. Acquired by the Corcoran Gallery the same year it was made, the photograph entered the National Gallery of Art’s collection as both a scientific document and a work of art. Beyond its technical achievement, the image quietly celebrates everyday motion. By isolating a simple domestic gesture, Muybridge transformed an ordinary act into a subject worthy of prolonged looking, inviting us to appreciate the grace hidden within routine movement.

About the Artist

Eadweard Muybridge · 1830–1904

Eadweard Muybridge (1830-1904) was an English-American photographer who revolutionized the understanding of motion through his pioneering chronophotographic studies. Born Edward James Muggeridge in Kingston upon Thames, England, he emigrated to America and became famous first for his dramatic landscape photographs of Yosemite Valley, then for his groundbreaking motion studies that proved horses li...