Myra Albert Wiggins: A Photographer's Life

For immediate release: Feb. 3, 2015
Media contact: Andrea Foust
Membership and Public Relations Manager
Hallie Ford Museum of Art at Willamette University | 503-370-6867
Public contact: 503-370-6855 | museum-art@willamette.edu

Historic Salem woman helped define photography as art to the world over 100 years ago

SALEM, Ore. — A major exhibition of Myra Albert Wiggins’s (1869-1956) photographs and ephemera will open Feb. 14 and continue through April 26 in the Study Gallery and Print Study Center at the Hallie Ford Museum of Art at Willamette University. "Myra Albert Wiggins: A Photographer's Life" has been organized by Professor Emeritus of Art History and Senior Faculty Curator, Roger Hull, and includes photographs and ephemera drawn from the museum and the Pacific Northwest Artists Archive at Willamette University.

Born and raised in Salem, Ore., Wiggins was a painter, poet and singer, as well as an instructor, essayist and speaker on art topics. But it was as a photographer that she established herself as an internationally recognized artist. From the late 1890s until 1910, her photographs were exhibited throughout the United States, as well as Paris, Vienna and London.

Wiggins attended Willamette University and Mills College, and in 1891 she began three years of study at the Art Students League in New York, where she received instruction from leading American painters William Merritt Chase, George DeForest Brush and Kenyon Cox. Her photographic interests prompted her to join the Society of Amateur Photographers of New York where she met and impressed a fellow member, Alfred Stieglitz, who was to become the most famous and influential photographer of the era.

She returned to Salem and in 1894 she married Frederick Wiggins. During the next decade and half, Wiggins continued to gain recognition. She was especially known for her touching and award-winning pictorial Dutch genre photographs that focused on women and children. Her work won numerous prizes, including cash awards and even a trip to Paris in 1900.

When Stieglitz established the famed and exclusive Photo-Secession in 1903, he selected Wiggins as an associate member. The group promoted the controversial and hotly debated idea that photography should be acknowledged as a legitimate form of fine art.

In 1907 Wiggins moved with her husband and daughter, Mildred (Benz), to Toppenish, Wash. and to Seattle in 1932. Following 1910, Wiggins shifted the bulk of her time and effort to painting. Her greatest success and legacy remains to be her work as a photographer in a pivotal time that defined the way the world viewed photography.

Two lectures accompany the exhibition. On Feb. 15 Carole Glauber, a teacher, curator and author of "Myra Wiggins: The Witch of Kodakery," will discuss the life and career of the photographer. On March 15 Roger Hull will explore the art historical and photographic references found in Wiggins’s work. Both lectures are free and open to the public and will be held in the Roger Hull Lecture Hall at the Hallie Ford Museum of Art beginning at 2 p.m. The exhibition also includes a complimentary brochure by Hull.

Financial support for the exhibition has been provided by grants from the City of Salem’s Transient Occupancy Tax funds and the Oregon Arts Commission.

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ADDITIONAL PRESS KIT ITEMS

EXHIBITION RELATED EVENTS

Lecture
A Life in Pictures: Myra Albert Wiggins
Presented by Carole Glauber
Feb. 15, 2015 at 2 p.m.
Roger Hull Lecture Hall, Hallie Ford Museum of Art
Free and open to the public

Lecture
Art References, Art Echoes in the
Photography of Myra Albert Wiggins
Presented by Roger Hull
March 15, 2015 at 2 p.m.
Roger Hull Lecture Hall, Hallie Ford Museum of Art
Free and open to the public

About the Hallie Ford Museum of Art
Oregon's third largest art museum features works by Pacific Northwest and Native American artists, and includes a diverse collection of traditional European, American and Asian art, as well as artifacts that date from antiquity. Frequently changing exhibitions include lectures, special events, tours, artist demonstrations and educational opportunities for children and adults.

The museum is located at 700 State St. in Salem. Hours are Tuesday through Saturday from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. and Sunday from 1 to 5 p.m. The galleries are closed on Monday. General admission is $6, $4 for seniors and $3 for students 18 and older. Students 17 and under and children are admitted free. Admission is free for everyone on Tuesdays. For more information call 503-370-6855 or visit willamette.edu/go/hfma.