Alice Boughton Paintings

Alice Boughton was an American photographer born on May 14, 1866, in Brooklyn, New York. She was one of the early female photographers who gained prominence in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Boughton was initially trained as a painter but later turned to photography, studying under the well-known pictorialist Gertrude Käsebier.

In the early stages of her career, Boughton worked in Käsebier's studio, and this experience helped her develop a style that blended artistry with the emerging field of portrait photography. By 1890, she had opened her own studio in New York City. Her work was characterized by its soft focus and often featured allegorical or literary themes, which were common in the pictorialist movement—a style that emphasized beauty of subject matter, tonality, and composition rather than the documentation of reality.

Alice Boughton became a member of the Photo-Secession, a group of photographers led by Alfred Stieglitz that sought to elevate photography as a fine art rather than merely a means of mechanical reproduction. Throughout her career, Boughton was recognized for her portraits of notable literary, artistic, and intellectual figures of the time, including such luminaries as Y.B. Yeats, George Bernard Shaw, and Julia Ward Howe. In addition to portraiture, she also explored landscapes and garden photography, and her work was included in numerous exhibitions, including the seminal 1906 exhibition at the Worcester Art Museum which was one of the first solo exhibitions of any photographer's work.

Boughton's photography was well received, and she was awarded a bronze medal for her work at the Panama-Pacific International Exposition in 1915. She published a collection of portraits titled 'Photographs: Alice Boughton' in 1928, which further cemented her reputation as a leading photographer of her time.

Despite her success, Alice Boughton's work faded from public view after her death on June 21, 1943. It was not until the revival of interest in early photography and the contributions of women photographers that Boughton's work was rediscovered and appreciated by a new generation. Today, her photographs are considered important contributions to the pictorialist movement and the history of photography, particularly for her nuanced and evocative portraits.