JANE BYRD McCALL WHITEHEAD WITH RALPH RADCLIFFE-WHITEHEAD, JR.

Eva Watson-Schütze, Platinum print, 6 inches by 8 inches

pencil signed with Schütze’s dragonfly monogram

Eva Watson-Schütze (1867-1935) studied at the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts in Philadelphia where she may have Philadelphian Jane Byrd McCall for the first time. Her photographs were selected for exhibition at the academy in the first international photography exhibition (1898) to be held in a major American museum. She was a founding member of the Photo-Secession, which was led by Alfred Stieglitz and her works appeared in his periodical Camera Work. She married Martin Schütze in 1901 and moved to Chicago.

Several of the earliest Byrdcliffe residents hailed from Chicago and the Schützes were among them—they started spending summers there as early as 1903, which was the first season of the colony’s activity. That year Watson-Schütze began a large series of photographs of the Whitehead family focusing particularly on Jane, whom she frequently cast as a Pre-Raphaelite Madonna.

The Blessed Mother reference in this portrait is enforced by the shadowy image of a tapestry Madonna in the background. Jane wears a silver and moonstone brooch designed for her by C. R. Ashbee, who also designed christening cups for her two sons.

Provenance:
By descent from Peter Whitehead to Mark Willcox, Jr.