Selling Pictorialist Photography as Craft: Alice Austin’s Artistic Production and Role in the Boston Society of Arts and Crafts between 1900 and 1933

Abstract

Alice Austin (1862–1933) worked as a professional photographer in Boston from 1900 until 1933. She joined Alfred Stieglitz’s Photo-Secessionists group in 1905 and worked as a committee member at the Boston Society of Arts and Crafts for approximately thirty years. This article considers how Austin’s professional persona reflects the larger intersection of craft, gender, and photography in Boston during the first quarter of the twentieth century.In her capacity as artist and committee member, Austin emphasized craftsmanship—a concept that embodied both the handicraft tradition, in which it was permissible for women to take part, and Pictorialist fine art photography. The implication of this flexibility was profound for women such as Austin who were able to become professional photographers by aligning their artistic production with the larger handicraft tradition, thus placing photography within the domain of women’s work. Austin continued to argue for the intersection of craft and photography as a founding member of the Photography Guild at the Boston Society of Arts and Crafts after Pictorialist photography became outmoded with the rise of straight photography. Austin’s work was shown in at least thirteen exhibitions, including famed-photographer Frances Benjamin Johnston’s show on women artists at the 1900 Parisian Exposition Universelle. Austin was also referenced in at least twenty-one different photographic journals and twenty-five newspaper articles and popular publications during her lifetime. Yet despite her successful career and her significant contributions to the development of photography and craft, Austin’s work has been overlooked by scholars.