Mr. Mix began his photographic career in 1902 and is one of the pioneers in home portraiture. –Studio Light, September, 1917

Three separate interior poses of a little girl is captured in these home portraits by the artist, Edward Louis Mix: 1872-1948. (born Miksch)

The following article is from the September, 1917 issue of Studio Light magazine and reveals the artists “migratory” business model emphasizing home portraiture. Published by the Eastman Kodak Company, the article, titled “Our Illustrations” reproduced ten “home portraits” by Mix, along with another cover portrait of a child, all from original Kodak Artura Iris prints, a silver chloride, gaslight paper, manufactured to mimic the tonalities of a platinum paper. (1.)

Our Illustrations

As well-to-do New Yorkers migrate to summer homes along the seashore, certain lines of business in the big city are almost at a standstill during the summer months.

The New York photographer whose clientele is made up of this migrating class must also migrate if he wishes to keep busy the year round, otherwise he may as well take a good vacation during the summer months.

“Edward Louis Mix, Home Portraits, 2291 Broadway, New York-Summer Studio, Belmar, N. J.,” locates one photographer the year round and at either address he will be found busy and enthusiastic about his work. E. L. Mix needs no introduction to New York photographers, for he has served as president and secretary of the P. P S. of New York, is chairman of the Metropolitan Section, and is a member of the Professional Photographers’ Club of New York City.

Mr. Mix began his photographic career in 1902 and is one of the pioneers in home portraiture. From the time he made his first portraits in the home he has persisted in the belief that portraits with a homely, human interest-natural pictures of natural people made in familiar surroundings were the sort of pictures that would eventually please the public best and do most to establish his reputation as a photographer.

Our illustrations are fair examples of the general run of work which Mr. Mix produces. He considers the recommendations of pleased patrons his greatest asset. A characteristic portrait of mother, father or grandmother is a forceful advertisement of his ability and it reaches all the friends and relatives who receive the pictures. There is also a greater demand for pictures of real human interest. They are valued more, are often framed and made a part of the home where they become something more than an object to fill space. Such pictures are a real pleasure to live with as they grow in interest from day to day.

Mr. Mix believes in other forms of advertising, however, and uses many of the advertising examples we show in STUDIO LIGHT from month to month.

Our illustrations should be of special interest to those who have recently taken up home portraiture, representing as they do years of experience in this work.

It is difficult to induce people to visit the big city studios in warm weather, but in the cool summer homes at the seashore conditions are ideal for home portraiture, and it is here that Mr. Mix does some of his most interesting work.

Eastman products, “Tested Goods,” as Mr. Mix puts it, are used exclusively in his studios with a uniform quality of results most pleasing both to himself and his customers. pp. 15-18

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The following obituary was clipped by this archive in 2016 when these photographs were acquired, although we neglected to cite the source.

E.L. MIX, 76, PORTRAITURE PHOTOGRAPHER

Edward L. Mix, 76 of 208 Hempstead turnpike, West Hempstead, widely known photographer who specialized in home portraiture, died Wednesday night, after a short illness in Nazareth, Pa, at the home of his sister Miss Charlotte Mix, with who he had been living at the time of his death.

Simplicity and naturalness characterized Mr. Mix’s home portraiture and brought him renown in photographic circles throughout the country and abroad. He had been engaged in photography for 45 years but had been accepting only occasional photographic assignments of late years. He began his photographic career in 1902 when he opened a home portrait studio at New York City, with a summer studio at Belmar, N.J. Many of his impressionistic portraits were reproduced in photographic magazines as examples of home portraiture at its best. His portraits were so distinctive and different as to express as much the personality of the photographer as of the sitter.

Mr. Mix was especially known for his work with children where he eschewed the “watch the birdie” technique that he felt produced only wooden expressions in their children. He developed the faculty of catching his subjects unawares when their expressions were most natural. Mix had been appointed to serve as a judge on the awards committee for the seventh annual amateur movie contest at the Mineola fair this fall, but had to retire because of ill health which prompted him to move to Nazareth.

Mix resided in New York city until 1935 when he set up his studio in West Hempstead.

He is survived by a son, Charles L. Mix of West Hempstead; two brothers, Harry of Riverside, Cal., and Howard of Los Angeles, and a sister, Charlotte of Nazareth, Pa.

Funeral services will be held at 8 p.m. today, at the Bartholomew Funeral home at 211 West Center street, Nazareth, and internment will take place at 2:30 p.m. Saturday, in Evergreen cemetery, Brooklyn.

Mix was born in Nazareth, son of Lewis and Susan Kemmerer Mix, and was married to Edna Schrader of Nazareth who died some 15 years ago.

1. Richard Benson, quoted in: Topics in Photographic Preservation, Volumes 1-2; Volumes 4-, American Institute for Conservation, Photographic Materials Group, 1986, p. 69. The Artura Division of Eastman Kodak is mentioned in secondary published sources as early as 1907. Artura paper came in many grades and finishes, including POP and DOP papers.