George Washington Wilson (1823-93), born in the North East of Scotland, went to Edinburgh and then London in the 1840s to train as a portrait miniaturist. He became established in Aberdeen in the 1850s as an artist and photographer, and quickly made a name for himself among the middle classes and landed gentry. He soon moved into landscape photography, and, thanks to the proximity of Balmoral, developed a royal connection which remained throughout his career.
Wilson's camera ranged all over Britain, recording everything from the simple grandeur of Fingal's cave on the Isle of Staffa to the bustle of London's Oxford Street with its street criers and horse-drawn cabs. His son, Charles Wilson, and staff photographer, Fred Hardie, toured the colonial townships of South Africa and Australia, providing a vivid picture of gold miners and early settlers at work and play, and of the native or aboriginal way of life. They also travelled in the western Mediterranean, where they took images of Gibraltar and the south of Spain, Morocco and Tangiers.
Throughout, Wilson demonstrated technical and commercial acumen, and, by the early 1880s the company he founded had become the largest and best known photographic and printing firm in the world.
From the guide to the Papers relating to the George Washington Wilson photographic Collection, 1856 - 1997, (University of Aberdeen)
