George Henry Seeley (1880–1955) was an American photographer primarily associated with the

pictorialist Pictorialism is an international style and aesthetic movement that dominated photography during the later 19th and early 20th centuries. There is no standard definition of the term, but in general it refers to a style in which the photographer ha ...

movement. Seeley was born in

Stockbridge, Massachusetts Stockbridge is a town in Berkshire County in Western Massachusetts, United States. It is part of the Pittsfield, Massachusetts, Metropolitan Statistical Area. The population was 2,018 at the 2020 census. A year-round resort area, Stockbridge is h ...

and attended the Massachusetts Normal Art School from 1897 to 1901, as a student in painting.George Seeley: Winter Landscape

Metropolitan Museum of Art The Metropolitan Museum of Art of New York City, colloquially "the Met", is the largest art museum in the Americas. Its permanent collection contains over two million works, divided among 17 curatorial departments. The main building at 1000 ...

. He studied under

Joseph DeCamp Joseph Rodefer DeCamp (November 5, 1858February 11, 1923) was an American painter and educator. Biography Born in Cincinnati, Ohio, where he studied with Frank Duveneck. In the second half of the 1870s he went with Duveneck and fellow students ...

, who encouraged his interest in natural light, and became interested in photography after meeting F. Holland Day.George Seeley

Smithsonian American Art Museum The Smithsonian American Art Museum (commonly known as SAAM, and formerly the National Museum of American Art) is a museum in Washington, D.C., part of the Smithsonian Institution. Together with its branch museum, the Renwick Gallery, SAAM holds o ...

. He returned to Stockbridge in 1902, where he worked in both painting and photography. In 1904, his photographs were included in the First American Photographic Salon in New York City, where

Alfred Stieglitz Alfred Stieglitz (January 1, 1864 – July 13, 1946) was an American photographer and modern art promoter who was instrumental over his 50-year career in making photography an accepted art form. In addition to his photography, Stieglitz was kno ...

encountered them; Stieglitz then invited Seeley to join the Photo Secession, in which Seeley was a member from 1906 to 1910. After leaving Stieglitz's group, Seeley continued creating in a pictorialist aesthetic while the style as a whole declined in critical praise; this, coupled with wartime shortages in raw materials needed for photography, hurt Seeley's career as a photographer.George H. Seeley

Getty Museum The J. Paul Getty Museum, commonly referred to as the Getty, is an art museum in Los Angeles, California housed on two campuses: the Getty Center and Getty Villa. The Getty Center is located in the Brentwood neighborhood of Los Angeles and fe ...

. While Seeley continued exhibiting his photographs until the 1930s, little of what was shown was new material. Later in life, Seeley returned to painting, and also served as a newspaper correspondent for a Stockbridge publication. He died there in 1955.

References

External links

* * George H. Seeley Papers and Photographs. Yale Collection of American Literature, Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library. {{DEFAULTSORT:Seeley, George H. 1880 births 1955 deaths People from Stockbridge, Massachusetts 20th-century American photographers Photographers from Massachusetts Massachusetts College of Art and Design alumni