Photo By Gail

In this photograph referred to as Glass Tears (1930–33), the face of a model known as Lydia acts as a backdrop for a group of small, gleaming glass balls. Man Ray made multiple variants of the image, in which the balls, like tears, appear to move and multiply across her static face from one version to another. He originally conceived of this shot as an advertisement for smudge-proof mascara.

Photographed as part of the Exhibit, Man Ray: When Objects Dream, at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York.