Albert Sands Southworth and Josiah Johnson Hawes (American, 1811-1894 & 1808-1901)

"Boston Beauty," circa 1850

Whole plate daguerreotype vignette bound under original heavy brass mat

“The frame was oval… I had found the spell of the picture in an absolute life-likeness of expression, which, at first startling, finally confounded, subdued and appalled me.” This description, quoted from Edgar Allan Poe’s story “The Oval Portrait” (1884), might apply directly to this whole plate daguerreotype “Boston Beauty,” circa 1850, a fine example of the vignetted portraits of women by Southworth & Hawes (1811-94 & 1808-1901). Their celebrated nineteen-year Boston partnership of produced the finest portrait daguerreotypes in America for a clientele that included leading political, intellectual, and artistic figures. The firm was known for its aesthetic accomplishments and technical finesse.

Louis-Auguste Bisson (French, 1814-1876)

"Wildfire," circa 1844

Quarter plate daguerreotype

Louis-Auguste Bisson opened his own photographic studio in 1841 after learning the daguerreotype process directly from its inventor. Upon making improvements to the daguerreotype chemical process and increasing sensitivity, Bisson advertised daguerreotype portraits that could be taken within seconds indoors. His animal portraits, particularly those of horses, were skillful examples of his improved process and influenced a tradition of equine portraiture. The pose of this horse in profile with the groom standing at its head is rich in anatomical detail.

It is likely that Rosa Bonheur (1822-1899), the noted painter of animals, influenced Bisson's interest in animal art. After her mother’s death in 1833, eleven-year-old Bonheur was welcomed into the home of Madame Bisson, the mother of Louis-Auguste and his two brothers. She had loved animals since childhood and sketched them tirelessly encouraged by her artist father. At nineteen, her first submission to the 1841 Salon, attracted attention. Her success would have developed alongside Bisson's improvements to the daguerreotype process. The present example is one of a number of Bisson animal daguerreotypes originally owned by Rosa Bonheur.

Leonida Caldesi and Mattia Montecchi (Italian, 1822-1891 & 1816-1871)

The Serenade (Mario and Grisi in "Il Trovatore"), 1857

Albumen print from a collodion negative

41.8 x 34.9 cm

Portrayed are Mario De Candia, regarded as the foremost tenor of the 19th century, and his wife Giulia Grisi, the eminent soprano, striking their Trovatore pose. They premiered, to great acclaim, in the lead roles of Manrico and Leonora when Verdi's Il Trovatore was first performed in Britain in 1855. Photographers Caldesi and Montecchi worked together in London and specialized in art reproductions and society portraiture. This portrait was made outside their studio at a house later used by Camille Silvy. In September 1856, Mario leased Park House, a mansion in the Fulham section of London. Giulia Grisi's friend, Italian composer Luigi Arditi, cherished "the memory of countless happy days spent at the lovely house at Fulham, where Mario indulged in a mania for photography, and Caldesi was invariably present with his camera." A close variant of "The Serenade" is illustrated in Arditi's 1896 memoir, My Reminiscences. The intimacy between photographers and subjects is merged in this remarkable large-format operatic image.

Julia Margaret Cameron (English, born in India, 1815-1879)

"La Sainte Famille," 1872

Albumen print

34.5 x 27.6 cm

Julia Margaret Cameron (1815-1879) sought to record the qualities of innocence, wisdom, piety, or passion ascribed to great biblical, historical, and legendary figures through the faces of her family and friends. Soft focus and ethereal lighting instill this albumen print of “La Sainte Famille” with a painterly quality reminiscent of works by Renaissance artists. This may have been Cameron's intention as part of her strategy to elevate photography to the status of high-art. By contrast, Cameron's subjects, the Madonna with infants Jesus and John the Baptist, appear humble in their modest garments and with their tranquil demeanor. Her models were Rosie Prince, Mary Hillier, and Freddy Gould.

Giacomo Caneva (Italian, 1813-1865)

Girl with vase, Rome, 1850s

Coated salt or albumen print from a collodion negative

18.8 x 9.3 cm

Caneva was a Roman painter who took up photography.  He was the inspiration behind, and a founder of, the Caffe Greco School of painting and photography in Rome, where its members gathered at the base of the Spanish steps. Caneva's embrace of photography, first the daguerreotype and then the negative process, was a natural outgrowth of his training as a painter of perspective scenes. He was the first photographer working in nineteenth-century Rome to make genre scenes with peasants as a principle subject.

Duchenne de Boulogne and Adrien Tournachon (French, 1806-1875 & 1825-1903)

A false, incomplete expression of agreeable surprise, or admiration, 1862, negative, circa 1856

Albumen print from a glass negative

22.3 x 16.8 cm oval

A pioneering neurologist and physiologist, Duchenne de Boulogne (1806-1875) was the first scientist to explain that facial expressions were connected to human emotions through discrete muscle actions. The results of Duchenne’s experiments and collaboration with photographer Adrien Tournachon (1825-1903), illustrated in Mécanisme de la physionomie humaine, occupy a distinct place at the intersection of art and science. Duchenne's primary subject was this old, thin-faced, toothless man whose features lent themselves to the sometimes dramatic, even disturbing, expressions documented in Tournachon's photographs.

Louis-Emile Durandelle (French, 1839-1917)

Masques du vestibule circulaire, from "Le Nouvel Opéra de Paris, Sculpture Ornamentale," 1876

Albumen print from a collodion negative

21.2 x 27.8 cm

Louis-Emile Durandelle (1839-1917) was one of the most accomplished architectural photographers of the 19th century. His best-known body of work are the photographs of the construction of the Paris Opéra and its sculptural decorations in the 1860s. Charles Garnier won the commission to design the Opéra house in 1861 during France’s Second Empire, a period of rapid urban growth and opulent construction. Durandelle was hired to photograph details of the building before they were fitted into place. While his job was ostensibly simply documentary, his pictures of the Opéra’s ornaments and decorations are anything but. Durandelle often isolated the sparkling white marble or rich bronze pieces against a cloth backdrop, according each a distinction and an air of majesty before their installation as part of the carefully orchestrated program on the façade or in the interior.

William Henry Fox Talbot (English, 1800-1877)

Bust of Patroclus, 1842

Salt print from a calotype negative

13.0 x 12.8 cm on 23.0 x 18.8 cm paper

Patroclus, companion of Achilles, was William Henry Fox Talbot's (1800-1877) first and favorite portrait sitter. The plaster cast of him at Lacock Abbey was a copy of the marble in the British Museum. Talbot's chemistry required lengthy exposures and a stationary object, such as this bust, was the ideal subject. The brush strokes around the border of this exceptional salt print, printed from the same negative as Plate V in The Pencil of Nature, indicate that Talbot coated the sheet of paper by hand.