Frances Benjamin Johnston
After setting up her own photography studio in 1894, in Washington, D.C., Frances Benjamin Johnston was described by The Washington Times as “the only lady in the business of photography in the city.”1 Considered to be one of the first female press photographers in the United States, she took pictures of news events and architecture and made portraits of political and social leaders for over five decades. From early on, she was conscious of her role as a pioneer for women in photography, telling a reporter in 1893, “It is another pet theory with me that there are great possibilities in photography as a profitable and pleasant occupation for women, and I feel that my success helps to demonstrate this, and it is for this reason that I am glad to have other women know of my work.”2
In 1899, the principal of the Hampton Normal and Agricultural Institute in Virginia commissioned Johnston to take photographs at the school for the 1900 Exposition Universelle in Paris. The Hampton Institute was a preparatory and trade school dedicated to preparing African American and Native American students for professional careers. Johnston took more than 150 photographs and exhibited them in the Exposition Nègres d'Amerique (American Negro Exhibit) pavilion, which was meant to showcase improving race relations in America. The series won the grand prize and was lauded by both the public and the press.
Years later, writer and philanthropist Lincoln Kirstein discovered a leather-bound album of Johnston’s Hampton Institute photographs. He gave the album to The Museum of Modern Art, which reproduced 44 of its original 159 photographs in a book called The Hampton Album, published in 1966. In its preface, Kirstein acknowledged the conflict inherent in Johnston’s images, describing them as conveying the Institute’s goal of assimilating its students into Anglo-American mainstream society according to “the white Victorian ideal as criterion towards which all darker tribes and nations must perforce aspire.”3 The Hampton Institute's most famous graduate, educator, leader, and presidential advisor Booker T. Washington, advocated for black education and accommodation of segregation policies instead of political pressure against institutionalized racism, a position criticized by anti-segregation activists such as author W. E. B. Du Bois.
Johnston’s pictures neither wholly celebrate nor condemn the Institute’s goals, but rather they reveal the complexities of the school’s value system. This is especially clear in her photographs contrasting pre- and post-Hampton ways of living, including The Old Well and The Improved Well (Three Hampton Grandchildren). In both images, black men pump water for their female family members. The old well system is represented by an aged man, a leaning fence, and a wooden pump that tilts against a desolate sky, while the new well is handled by an energetic young boy in a yard with a neat fence, a thriving tree, and two young girls dressed in starched pinafores. Johnston’s photographs have prompted the attention of artists like Carrie Mae Weems, who has incorporated the Hampton Institute photographs into her own work to explore what Weems described as “the problematic nature of assimilation, identity, and the role of education.”4
Johnston’s photographs of the Hampton Institute were only a part of her long and productive career. Having started out by taking society and political portraits, she later extensively photographed gardens and buildings, hoping to encourage the preservation of architectural structures that were quickly disappearing. Her pictures documenting the changing landscape of early-20th-century America became sources for historians and conservationists and led to her recognition by the American Institute for Architects (AIA). At a time when photography was often thought of as scientific in its straightforwardness, Johnston recognized its expressive power. As she wrote in 1897, “It is wrong to regard photography as purely mechanical. Mechanical it is, up to a certain point, but beyond that there is great scope for individual and artistic expression.”5
Introduction by Kristen Gaylord, Beaumont and Nancy Newhall Curatorial Fellow, Department of Photography, 2016
“Washington Women with Brains and Business,” The Washington Times, April 21, 1895, 9.
Clarence Bloomfield Moore, “Women Experts in Photography,” The Cosmopolitan XIV.5 (March 1893), 586.
Lincoln Kirstein, “Introduction,” in The Hampton Album: 44 photographs by Frances B. Johnston from an album of Hampton Institute (New York: The Museum of Modern Art, 1966), 10.
Quoted in Denise Ramzy and Katherine Fogg, “Interview: Carrie Mae Weems,” Carrie Mae Weems: The Hampton Project (New York: Aperture, 2000), 78.
Frances Benjamin Johnston, “What a Woman Can Do with a Camera,” The Ladies’ Home Journal (September 1897): 6-7.
- Introduction
- Frances Benjamin Johnston (January 15, 1864 – May 16, 1952) was an early American photographer and photojournalist whose career lasted for almost half a century. She is most known for her portraits, images of southern architecture, and various photographic series featuring African Americans and Native Americans at the turn of the 20th century.
- Wikidata
- Q462707
- Introduction
- Johnston was the first recognized female press photographer in the United States. She was associated with the Photo-Secession and the Camera Club on New York. In 1909, Johnston began a series of photographs documenting historic buildings and gardens in the southern United States. American photographer.
- Nationality
- American
- Gender
- Female
- Roles
- Artist, Photographer
- Name
- Frances Benjamin Johnston
- Ulan
- 500009325
Exhibitions
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Taking a Thread for a Walk
Oct 21, 2019–Jan 10, 2021
MoMA
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502: Early Photography and Film
Ongoing
MoMA
Collection gallery
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Lincoln Kirstein’s Modern
Mar 17–Jun 15, 2019
MoMA
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Frank Lloyd Wright at 150: Unpacking the Archive
Jun 12–Oct 1, 2017
MoMA
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Century of the Child: Growing by Design, 1900–2000
Jul 29–Nov 5, 2012
MoMA
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Frances Benjamin Johnston has
18 exhibitionsonline.
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Frances Benjamin Johnston Penmanship Class 1899
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Frances Benjamin Johnston Gainsboro' Girl 1900
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Frances Benjamin Johnston General Samuel Chapman Armstrong. Born in the Sandwich Islands 1831. Founded Hampton Institute 1868. Died, its Principal, May 11, 1893 1899-1900
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Frances Benjamin Johnston Rev. Hollis Burke Frissell, D.D. Chaplain 1880 - 1893. Principal 1893 - 1899-1900
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Frances Benjamin Johnston Northern Water Front. Treasurer's Home. "Winona" for Indian Girls. Girls' Cottage. Virginia Hall. Griggs' Hall 1899-1900
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Frances Benjamin Johnston Southern Water-Front. Mansion House. Memorial Church. Academic and Science Halls. Huntington Industrial Works 1899-1900
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Frances Benjamin Johnston Southern Water-Front 1899-1900
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Frances Benjamin Johnston About 400 Students in Memorial Chapel 1899-1900
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Frances Benjamin Johnston Without Education. Mrs. Black nail and child. Sioux 1899-1900
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Frances Benjamin Johnston With Education. Kate H. McCaw and family. A Hampton Graduate 1899-1900
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Frances Benjamin Johnston The Pappoose 1899-1900
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Frances Benjamin Johnston The Indian Baby. Child of a Hampton graduate 1899-1900
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Frances Benjamin Johnston Seven little Sioux Indians. Children of uneducated parents 1899-1900
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Frances Benjamin Johnston Benjamin and Ida Brave - Hampton students - and their family. Sioux 1899-1900
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Frances Benjamin Johnston Cracking Wing. Gros Ventri Tribe. On arrival at Hampton 1880 1899-1900
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Frances Benjamin Johnston Adele Quinney. Stockbridge Tribe. A girl whose every physical measurement is artistically correct 1899-1900
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Frances Benjamin Johnston John Wizi. Sioux. Son of Chief Wizi of Crow Creek, S.D. 1899-1900
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Frances Benjamin Johnston The old tipi life among the Sioux 1899-1900
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Frances Benjamin Johnston Present cabin life among the Sioux 1899-1900
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Frances Benjamin Johnston Farms and homes of Hampton students. Indian 1899-1900
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Frances Benjamin Johnston Barn on a "one mule farm." 1899-1900
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Frances Benjamin Johnston Model barn at Hampton with simple silo 1899-1900
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Frances Benjamin Johnston Plowing after the old method 1899-1900
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Frances Benjamin Johnston Plowing by the scientific method 1899-1900
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Frances Benjamin Johnston The old folks at home 1899-1900
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Frances Benjamin Johnston A Hampton graduate at home 1899-1900
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Frances Benjamin Johnston The old-time cabin 1899-1900
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Frances Benjamin Johnston A Hampton graduate's home 1899-1900
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Frances Benjamin Johnston The Old Well 1899-1900
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Frances Benjamin Johnston The improved well. (Three Hampton grandchildren.) 1899-1900
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Frances Benjamin Johnston Saluting the Flag at the Whittier Primary School 1899-1900
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Frances Benjamin Johnston Kindergarten children in their garden 1899-1900
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Frances Benjamin Johnston Kindergarten children washing and ironing 1899-1900
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Frances Benjamin Johnston Primary class studying plants. Whittier School 1899-1900
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Frances Benjamin Johnston Gymnastics at the Whittier 1899-1900
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Frances Benjamin Johnston Thanksgiving Day lesson at the Whittier 1899-1900
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Frances Benjamin Johnston An arithmetic lesson at the Whittier 1899-1900
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Frances Benjamin Johnston A sewing lesson at the Whittier 1899-1900
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Frances Benjamin Johnston Manual Training at the Whittier 1899-1900
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Frances Benjamin Johnston The Post-graduate Class of 1900 1900
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Frances Benjamin Johnston English. Studying the cone-bearing trees 1899-1900
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Frances Benjamin Johnston English. Compositions of the cone-bearing trees 1899-1900
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Frances Benjamin Johnston English. Study in the Library 1899-1900
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Frances Benjamin Johnston English Literature, Lesson on Whittier, Middle Class, The Hampton Institute, Hampton, Virginia 1899-1900
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Frances Benjamin Johnston History. Class in American History 1899-1900
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Frances Benjamin Johnston History. A class at Fort Monroe 1899-1900
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Frances Benjamin Johnston History. Class in Ancient History. Seniors 1899-1900
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Frances Benjamin Johnston History. Class in Bible History. Juniors 1899-1900
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