Editorial comment for this plate:

EASTER MORNING.

Our frontispiece this week is an appropriate figure picture by Miss Emily V. Clarkson, of Pottsdam, N. Y. The pose, the lighting, and the general arrangement of the picture are in excellent taste, and the photographing has been done with the skill which comes from experience. Simple in subject, Miss Clarkson has given us a picture which is entirely complete and satisfactory.

In photography, as in speech or writing, it requires more thought often to be simple and brief than to treat a subject elaborately and at length; and in photography, as in literature, the result of the greatest labor is the most satisfactory.

The negative has been reproduced by the New York Photo-Gravure Company in their high-grade copper plate process. It might also be mentioned in this connection that Miss Clarkson is a Chautauquan, and was one of a number who sent photographs to be exhibited in Vienna next summer as representative work from the Chautauqua School of Photography.

Emilie Vallete Clarkson: 1863-1946

American photographer Emilie Clarkson was a member of the Society of Amateur Photographers of New York and the Camera Club of New York. Her photographs appeared in the publications American Annual of Photography, theAmerican Amateur Photographer and the Photographic Times. Alfred Stieglitz included her work in Camera Notes.—Wikipedia (2026)

Emilie Clarkson Moore: A Lady Photographer

courtesy: Christian A. Peterson. Pictorial Photography at the Minneapolis Institute of Arts : Privately Published, 2012.

Emilie Clarkson began taking photographs in 1888, and she graduated from the Chautauqua School of Photography in 1890. That same year, she joined the Society of Amateur Photographers of New York (SAPNY). She started exhibiting her images the following year. In 1893, she launched solo screenings of her work in New York, Brooklyn and Rochester, and she won prizes for her slides from SAPNY and at competitions run by Amateur Photographer magazine. Clarkson was active in producing lantern slides, and was equally proficient at landscapes, portraits and genre scenes.

In 1894, two prominent photography periodicals included articles about Clarkson and her work. The American Amateur Photographer included her in its list of “Prominent Amateur Photographers.” Alfred Stieglitz was also on the list that year. In August 1894, the Photographic Times ran a three-page article on Clarkson as part of its “Distinguished Photographers of Today” series.

Clarkson became the only female founding member of the Camera Club of New York in 1896. In 1898, the Camera Club’s quarterly, Camera Notes featured a full-page photogravure of her image, “Spinning” and more images were included in two portfolios of photogravures produced by the Camera Club in 1899 and 1901.

She exhibited her work worldwide, including salons in London, Paris, Milan and Calcutta. Her last known display was part of the 1901 Glasgow International Exhibition.