Maine Photography

A History, 1840-2015

Libby Bischof, Susan Danly, Earle G. Shettleworth

• Publisher: Down East Books
• Year: 2023
• eBook ISBN:
  9781493082759
• Topic: Art
• Subtopic: History of Art

Maine has always played a rich and varied role in the art of photography. For hundreds of years, photographers, like other artists, have made their way to Maine to capture the natural beauty and human culture of the state. So, too, have many photographers come from Maine, and many contributions by Mainers have been made to the medium. Maine in Photography is the first comprehensive overview of the history of photography in the state. Providing basic knowledge of the most important people and institutions to have promoted photography, this volume also studies the ways in which photography has informed the understanding of the social and cultural history of Maine.
Beginning with the earliest daguerreotype portraits of the 1840s, this history traces the growth of the medium—emphasizing key contributions, such as the Stanley brothers’ invention of the dry plate process—through to the present. Key topics addressed throughout the book include the importance of photography in documenting labor and economic life, the close relationship between photography and the growth of tourism, and the role of Maine photographers in advancing the medium as a fine art form. Published in conjunction with the Maine Photo Project, this is a unique and timely addition to the body of work on the importance of Maine to American art.

Table of contents

• Introduction
• Acknowledgments
• Chapter 1 Maine Photography: The First Twenty-Five Years
• Chapter 2 The Photography of Tourism, 1865–1940
• Chapter 3 Four Early Maine Women Photographers, 1870–1930: A Paradigm
• Chapter 4 Photography in the Service of Art
• Chapter 5 Pictorialist Photography in Maine, 1890–1940
• Chapter 6 At Work in Maine: Photographs of Labor
• Chapter 7 Twentieth-Century Photographers “From Away”
• Chapter 8 The Workshops: Contemporary Photographic Practice in Maine
• Chapter 9 Collecting and Exhibiting Contemporary Photography in Maine
• Chronological Glossary of Photographic Terms
• The Maine Photo Project: A Statewide Photography Collaboration in 2015–2016
• Significant Photographic Archives and Collections in Maine
• Bibliography