Alfred Stieglitz's contribution to the history of photography extends far beyond his photographic work, which he began as a student in Germany in 1883. He influenced generations of photographers, painters, and sculptors both directly and indirectly. In 1905, with Edward Steichen, he founded the Little Galleries of the Photo-Secession at 291 Fifth Avenue in New York, which later became known simply as
291 . He elevated photography's status to the level of painting and sculpture through the numerous pioneering exhibitions that he organized.
Stieglitz was a founder of the Photo-Secessionist and Pictorialist photography movements in the United States and promoted them in
Camera Notes and
Camera Work , the influential journals that he founded and edited. His early photographs were Pictorialist in style. His late work focused in depth on a few subjects, including New York City, the cloud studies that he called "Equivalents," and a portrait series of his wife, the painter Georgia O'Keeffe. Stieglitz worked tirelessly through his efforts as a photographer, collector, curator, writer, and publisher to secure photography's role as a legitimate medium of fine art. (Once again, courtesy of the Getty Museum website....too tired to come up with my own stuff)
