Hannah Maynard

At a time when few were working professionally with cameras, Hannah Maynard (1834-1918) made history with her boundless creativity and entrepreneurial acumen, becoming the first woman in British Columbia to establish a professional photography studio. In 1863, just a little over two decades after photography's invention, she established the Mrs. R. Maynard's Photographic Gallery, which she operated for nearly fifty years.

Hannah Maynard: Life & Work shares the remarkable story of how Maynard left Cornwall, England at the age of eighteen and settled in Bowmanville, Ontario, where she soon began to learn the still-novel medium of photography. The book details how in 1862, along with her husband Richard and their young children, the family moved to the newly incorporated city of Victoria, British Columbia, where Maynard opened her studio, a business that became a civic crossroads attracting an array of clients: from babies to convicts, itinerant sailors to dignitaries, and servants to industrialists.

Author Elizabeth Anne Cavaliere shines a light on Maynard's innovative use of the camera, from her uncanny multiple exposure images and imaginative tableaux vivants to her striking and expansive portraiture work. She traces how Maynard combined her bold industriousness with an approach to portraiture that was equal parts sensitive, inventive, and savvy. Cavaliere's study positions Maynard as a pioneering photographer whose curiosity, cleverness, and originality continues to inspire new interpretations of her work and a renewed appreciation of her life. A comprehensive and unforgettable look at Maynard's career, this essential book celebrates one of the first women photographers working in nineteenth-century Canada and honours her creative legacy.