A Rare Studio Photograph by One of California's Early Female Photographers - Ella M. Morris

Santa Cruz, CA: By the photographer, 1883. Very good. Studio portrait, n. d. (ca 1883); 6 1/2 x 4 1/4; photographer's imprint in gilt (Mrs.Morris / Santa Cruz, Cal.); image of a young boy, dressed as a dapper gentleman, including a walking cane and a bowler hat - on what appears to be an artistically blurred background; residual paper to corners on verso from being removed from a photo album; a few small spots; in very good condition.Born in Massachusetts in 1852, Ella moved to California as a child and by 1883 - she was the photographer and sole owner of a portrait studio at 166 Pacific Avenue. After marrying a local upholsterer in the late 1880s - Samuel I. Morris - the couple formed a partnership and the name of the business was changed to "Mr. and Mrs. Morris" and the operation was extended to include stereoviews of local landmarks.Interestingly enough, while blurring of the background seems to have been fairly common at the time - it was mostly accidental - the result of the nature of the lenses. Here, on the other hand, the blur effect appears to have been intentional - perhaps, as an early form of "pictorialism," where photographers actively used selective focus and soft-focus lenses to blur backgrounds to make photos look more like paintings, rejecting the sharp "mechanical" look of early photography.While "Mr. and Mrs. Morris" stereoviews and portraits occasionally do appear in the trade and are recorded (in the Palmquist Collection at Yale, etc.) - we have never seen one from Ella's earliest days as a photographer, before the partnership with her husband.