A woman wearing a mob cap looks into the camera lens. The orientation of the photograph may have been intended as vertical. (based on location of atelier attribution)

Emma Rayson Barton: 1872-1938

Biography by Paula Vellet: from Hundred Heroines: a contemporary museum and gallery dedicated to women in photography, based in Gloucestershire.

Remembered as one of the first pioneering women in photography, Emma Rayson Barton (b. 1872, Birmingham) first became known for her 1899 portraits of the music hall performer Dan Leno.

Working as Mrs G A Barton, her style was influenced by the Pictorialists such as Julia Margaret Cameron, and by the Pre-Raphaelites, whose idealised women subjects she emulated in photographs such as ‘The Soul of the Rose’ (1905).

She was active from 1899 to the end of WW1, becoming a member of the Birmingham Photographic Society and then the Royal Photographic Society (RPS) in 1901.

Her first exhibited work ‘Meditation’ appeared in the RPS Forty-sixth Annual Exhibition, followed by the award-winning ‘The Awakening’ in 1903.

Emma’s self-taught work was very popular and appeared in publications such as The Sketch, Graphic, The Sphere, Country Life, and Illustrated London News.

At the height of her fame she was the most published woman photographer of her time, rivalling her contemporary Christina Broom (1862–1939).

Her portraits also appeared in the anthologies Photograms of the Year, annual reviews of international Pictorial photographic work. Her style eventually fell out of fashion after the war.

Her black and white photograph ‘ The First Communion’, c. 1914,  was awarded a medal from the Royal Photographic Society.

Like another contemporary Olive Edis (1876-1955), Emma experimented with the colour autochrome.

Her lovely 1919 study ‘Old Familiar Flowers’ is in the collection of the National Museum of Science & Media / Science & Society Picture Library.

Unlike Olive, Emma did not document the war or its aftermath except in her photograph ‘The War Widow’, which appeared in the 16th June 1915 edition of The Sketch.

Emma’s work can be found in the collections of the V&A, the National Portrait Gallery, and the British Newspaper Archive/British Library.

A list of her exhibited works can be found in the Catalogue records from the annual exhibitions of the Royal Photographic Society 1870-1915.

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Born Emma Boaz Rayson into a working-class family in Birmingham, she became the common-law wife of a solicitor, George Barton with whom she had a son Cecil Raleigh Barton. She was first introduced to photography by the brother-in-law of her stepfather, and first became known by publishing portraits of Dan Leno, the music hall star and relative of her husband, in 1898. She is one of the few women photographers highly respected for her work during this time period. -Wikipedia (2025) continues…

A mobcap (or mob cap or mob-cap) is a round, gathered or pleated cloth (usually linen) bonnet consisting of a caul to cover the hair, a frilled or ruffled brim, and (often) a ribbon band, worn by married women in the 18th and early 19th centuries, when it was called a “bonnet”. These caps were always gathered to a flat, often curved, brim. The caul had a flat bottom and curved top. The bottom was typically gathered to fit the back neck with a drawstring, while the curved sides and top were tightly gathered and stitched to the brim, which typically had some curves, too. Originally an informal style, the bonnet became a high-fashion item as part of the adoption of simple “country” clothing in the later 18th century. It was an indoor fashion, and was worn under a hat for outdoor wear. -Wikipedia (2025) continues…