Seema Weatherwax

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Seema Aissen Weatherwax (born August 25, 1905 in Chernigov , Russian Empire , † June 25, 2006 in Santa Cruz , California ) was an American photographer.

Life

Seema Aissen was born as the second of three daughters to the strictly Jewish couple Avram and Reva Aissen. Due to the anti-Jewish sentiment in the Russian Empire, the family emigrated to the United Kingdom in 1912 and then to Boston in the United States in 1922 . There she took her first job in a photo lab . She then continued this activity in laboratories in New Jersey , New Mexico , California and Tahiti . She was also active in the Young Communist League . In Tahiti she also started taking photos herself.

In Los Angeles , she joined the Workers Film and Photo League in the 1930s . She has campaigned for equality throughout her life. She was friends for many years with artists and political activists such as Edward Weston , Imogen Cunningham and Woody Guthrie . She worked for Ansel Adams in Yosemite National Park and became close friends with his family. In 1942 she left Yosemite to marry Jack Weatherwax, for whom she also worked as a photo technician. She supported his writing and also his leftist activities in Los Angeles. In 1984 they moved to Santa Cruz , California, where their husband passed away three weeks after the move.

After a year of mourning, Seema Weatherwax went public and exhibited her own art and photo collection at benefit shows. She joined the local organizations of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) and the Women's International League for Peace and Freedom (WILPF), was elected to the leadership of both organizations, and was soon well known in Santa Cruz.

Shortly before her 94th birthday, she decided to still print some of her old negatives. She started to rethink and decided to focus more on her own work. In 1999 she was named Women of the Year by the California Parliament . So in 2000 she started organizing public exhibitions. In 2005, the fifth public exhibition of her work took place on the occasion of a special exhibition at the University of California at Santa Cruz. In the same year she celebrated her hundredth birthday and in August 2005 she was also able to experience the publication of her biography, Seema's Show: A Life on the Left, edited by Sara Halprin . This was published by the University of New Mexico Press and is based on interviews dating back to 1986.

Seema Weatherwax passed away in Santa Cruz on June 25, 2006, two months before her 101st birthday.

estate

  • Tapes and interview transcripts are in the Special Collections of the University of California at Santa Cruz. Most of her photographs can also be found there, some more are in the Special Collection at Stanford University .
  • Jack Weatherwax's written estate is administered by the Smithsonian Institution .

literature

  • P. Buhle, EB Buhle, Eds. Sullivan: Images of American Radicalism , The Christopher Publishing House, Hanover, MA, 1998 (with two photos by Seema Weatherwax)
  • C. Wilson, W. Madar: Through Another Lens: My Years with Edward Weston , North Point Press, Farrar, Straus and Giroux, New York, 1998
  • Sara Halprin: Seema's Show: A Life on the Left , The University of New Mexico Press, Albuquerque, New Mexico, 2005, ISBN 082633847X , OCLC 58546055

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Obituary. Official website, July 10, 2010, accessed March 3, 2012 .
  2. ^ Sentinel Staff Report. August 19, 2006, accessed March 3, 2012 .
personal data
SURNAME Weatherwax, Seema
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Aissen Weatherwax, Seema (full name); Aissen, Seema (maiden name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION American photographer
DATE OF BIRTH August 25, 1905
PLACE OF BIRTH Chernihiv , Russian Empire
DATE OF DEATH June 25, 2006
Place of death Santa Cruz (California)