Photographic History Collection: Pirie MacDonald
notes: label: Description
content: The Pirie MacDonald collection in the National Museum of American History’s Photographic History Collection consists of eight photogravure carbon print photographs. Ranging in date from 1915 to 1933, the photographs are representative of the style of portraiture MacDonald developed in his Albany studio and adhered to throughout his career. The images are soft-focus head and shoulder portraits characterized by strong lighting. MacDonald is known for having photographed some of the most notable figures from the first half of the twentieth century, including images in the Collection- sculptor Frederick William MacMonnies, explorer Roald Amundsen, T.R. Roosevelt the twenty-sixth President of the United States, poet John Masefield, the politician Elihu Root, and lithographer Joseph Pennell. The other two images in the collection are of an unidentified man and MacDonald’s self-portrait.
label: Description
content: Pirie MacDonald was born in Chicago, Illinois on January 27, 1867 to Scottish immigrants. He began his study of photography with several apprenticeships in Europe and then as an assistant to the photographer Frank Forshew in Albany. MacDonald opened his own studio in Albany in 1890 where he specialized in photographing women. His financial and critical success allowed him to move his studio to New York City in 1900. The move triggered a change in MacDonald’s work and he decided to only photograph men, declaring that women refused to sacrifice their vanity for a true camera portrait. MacDonald became one of the premiere portrait photographers in New York City. This meant that his clients sought him out. The only two occasions that MacDonald accepted invitations to make a portrait outside of his studio were in 1920 to photograph the King of Denmark and the President of Czechoslovakia. He even made Teddy Roosevelt travel to New York for his portrait rather than making the trip to the White House. MacDonald was also a prolific writer, often contributing editorials to photographic publications as well as drafting the drill manual for the Boy Scouts of America. He was involved in extensive charity work privately and as president of the New York Rotary Club. By the 1930s, MacDonald’s style of portraiture had begun to be considered old fashioned but he continued to work until he suffered a cerebral hemorrhage and died on April 22, 1942. In accordance with his will, all of his photographic negatives were destroyed within a year of his death.
label: Description
content: MacDonald had a great love of genuineness and his goal in making a portrait was not just to capture the likeness of the sitter, but also to draw out their essential qualities and expression. MacDonald believed that a true camera portrait was a revelation of the subject. By removing all nonessential props and isolating the figure in a nondescript space, MacDonald could augment the main focus of his portraits; expression and posture using light and dark tones to sculpt and define a man’s visage. MacDonald utilized light to simultaneously subdue all non-essential detail whilst also highlighting particular and unexpected details that make his portraits dynamic and painterly. MacDonald’s photographs are unabashed, he does not hide wrinkles and blemishes instead he uses them to accentuate the character of his sitter. In all of the photographs there is a great emphasis on the brow because these are thinking men. MacDonald’s portraits are iconic in that they assist us in defining the historical figures he photographed. Although the photographs are not particularly large each man fills the image, appearing to be forceful and imposing. MacDonald’s images illustrate white masculine ideals at the beginning of the last century. Appropriately these iconic images made by MacDonald were often used to illustrate newspaper articles or to accompany obituaries in which a man’s life and worth are summed up.
label: Description
content: Although the National Museum of American History holds only a small representation of his work, they serve to illustrate the importance and lasting influence of his work. Perhaps not a well-known photographer, MacDonald’s work and writing on the art of photography provided inspiration and ideas to other photographers like Nickolas Muray. The National Museum of American History’s collection contains some important highlights of MacDonald’s career but the New York Historical society is in possession of the majority of MacDonald’s extant photographs.
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content: Work and Industry: Photographic History
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content: Photography
dataSource: label: Data Source
content: National Museum of American History
identifier: label: ID Number
content: COLL.PHOTOS.000087
objectType: label: Object Name
content: Pirie MacDonald collection