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Women who photographed outside the lines Century-old images go on view Friday By BILL VARBLE When a new photo exhibit called "Sisters of the Light" opens Friday at the Schneider Museum of Art, the choral group Women With Wings will be, well, in the wings, to welcome the show in song. Pioneer showcased top art The Photo-Secession movement bloomed in New York City from the turn of the century until about the time of World War I under the tutelage of photo pioneer Alfred Stieglitz. In the journal "Camera Work" (1903-1917), Stieglitz created a showcase for the top art photography of the day as well as modern art from Europe (including drawings by Rodin and Matisse before they were famous to the world at large). Stieglitz and the Photo-Secessionists, reacting to what they saw as the commercialization of photography, insisted on the merits of photo images as art. The movement played a part in the development of photogravure, an expensive and laborious printing process involving copper plates and acid baths. "Camera Work" featured exquisite, original negative photogravures printed on fine stock. By treating and presenting such pieces as works of art and not mere reproductions or commercial products, Stieglitz and his followers hoped to promote the idea of the photograph as art. Where to see these photos WHAT : "Sisters of the Light," an exhibit of century-old photographs by three women photographers WHERE : Schneider Museum of Art on the Southern Oregon University campus in Ashland WHEN : Through Feb. 19. SPECIAL EVENTS : Opening reception -- 5 to 7 p.m. Friday Brown-bag lecture by Portland Art Museum Curator Terry Toedtemeier -- noon Jan. 20 Slide lecture -- 7 p.m. Jan. 20, Room 230 of SOU's Churchill Hall. Which seems fitting for Myra Wiggins' pictorialist images of Oregon's past, Lily B. White's lush landscapes of the Columbia Gorge, maybe even a print by famed early photography maestro Alfred Stieglitz. "Sisters of the Light" brings together century-old photographs by Oregonians Wiggins, White and a third pioneering woman photographer, Sarah Ladd, in a show that opens Friday. Wiggins, White and Ladd were the Oregon contingent of a movement called the Photo-Secessionists. Adherents consciously abandoned or seceded from the commercial photography then prevalent. Stieglitz, whose goal it was to get photography accepted as a fine art, founded the movement in 1902. He accepted only a half-dozen members on the West Coast. Amateur photographers carried the banner of the original, creative, naturalistic work of the day. Professional photography was dominated by strict rules and a posed aesthetic. Portland Art Museum Curator Toedtemeier says camera companies such as Kodak targeted women as customers in magazines such as Ladies Home Journal and Cosmopolitan. Myra Albert Wiggins wrote for newspapers and magazines, made photos for early Kodak ad campaigns and documented the landscape of Oregon when she wasn't traveling abroad. For romantic portraits like one of a young girl in a lily pond, she wasn't above approaching strangers such as a young girl she met on a train and posing them. She documented her travels to such then-exotic destinations as Nazareth or the Sea of Galilee with shots of fishermen in a small sailboat or young boys at school. By 1899, photography pioneer George Eastman was using Wiggins' photos to promote his cameras. In that era, it was unusual for women to be in business or to travel alone, let alone to become artists of any standing. White and Ladd often worked on White's houseboat, and both used photos to capture the moods of the Columbia River. White's boat, the Raysark, was even equipped with a darkroom with running water. "Sunset Storm Columbia," a platinum print, catches the gorge on a cloudy afternoon when mirrored water reflected surging clouds. Studies of St. Peter's Dome and Rooster Rock capture well-known Oregon landmarks. Another theme of White's was Dutch genre photos that recall the themes of some of the old Dutch master painters. Today such photos are worth thousands of dollars. In 1902, works by Wiggins, White and Ladd were exhibited by the prestigious New York Camera Club. Since then, work by all three women has been exhibited all over the world. It's seen as bridging the gap between photography of the western and eastern United States as the 19th century was giving way to the industrial age. Mail Tribune Copyright � The Mail Tribune 2000, Medford, Oregon USA