THE REALISTIC IDEAL IN WESTERN ART.
This ideal carries through from the Renaissance to today in painting, photography, cinema, and
video.
The French film critic Andre Bazin, in his book, WHAT IS CINEMA?, defined it as
THE CREATION OF AN IDEAL WORLD IN THE LIKENESS OF THE REAL,
WITH IT’S OWN TEMPORAL DESTINY.”
Bazin maintained that the realist ideal was a continuum in Western art that transcends individual
Media, and that if the Renaissance masters could have, they would have been working in wide
screen technicolor.
large scale works for mass audiences.
major themes of the time, not personal.
didactic and propagandistic values, meant to teach as well as entertain.
2. THE INVENTION OF PHOTOGRAPHY IMPERATIVE.
In the year of Daguerre’s invention, 1839, the acquired knowledge had become so
convincing and the need of the invention so pressing that IT COULD NO LONGER BE
DELAYED by any difficulties or obstacles.
3. FORERUNNERS.
Prior to an invention’s success, numerous forerunners have consciously attempted the
same idea, without success.
4. SUPERPERSONAL HISTORY
The forerunners who started too early and were doomed to fail to create the groundwork
and concentrate the forces that ultimately make the invention imperative. Each personal
achievement should be seen as part of a larger superpersonal history and will.
5. EXPANDING AUDIENCE FOR THE VISUAL ARTS.
The new century produced an expanded middle class hungry for more portable,
easy to reproduce works of art, particularly etchings, engravings, lithographs.
THE INVENTION OF PHOTOGRAPHY
Tiphaigne de la Roche
GIPHANTIE
1760
Science fiction.
Written 80 years before the invention of photography, the following excerpt of this work of
“science fiction” expresses a long cherished dream of humanity - to fix the reflections of the
mirror and make pictures without the aid of the artist's pencil.
That window, that vast horizon, those black clouds, that raging sea, are all but a picture .
. . You know that the rays of light, reflected from different bodies, form a picture, and
paint the image reflected on all polished surfaces, for instance, on the retina of the eye,
on water, and on glass.
The elemental spirits have sought to fix these fleeting images; they have composed a
subtle matter, very viscous and quick to harden and dry, by means of which a picture is
formed in the twinkling of an eye.
They coat a piece of canvas with this matter, and hold it in front of the objects they
wish to paint.
The first effect of this canvas is similar to that of a mirror; one sees there
all objects, near and far, the image of which light can transmit.
But what a glass cannot do, the canvas, by means of its viscous matter, retains the
images.
The mirror represents the objects faithfully, but retains them not; our canvas shows them
with the same exactness, and retains them all.
This impression of the image is instantaneous, and the canvas is immediately carried
away into some dark place.
An hour later the impression is dry, and you have a picture the more valuable in that it
cannot be imitated by art or destroyed by time . . .
The correctness of the drawing, the truth of the expression, the stronger or weaker
strokes, the gradation of the shades, the rules of perspective, all these we leave to
Nature, who with a sure and never erring hand, draws upon our canvasses images which
deceive the eye.
EARLY EXPERIMENTS IN LIGHT AND CHEMISTRY
In 1725 Johann Heinrich Schulze discovered the light sensitivity of silver. Schulze noticed the
effect (using chalk dipped in silver nitrate and nitric acid) and tried to reproduce it with heat.
When these experiment failed he turned to the effect of light, and found that this produced the
darkening. Schulze carried out a number of lecture demonstrations using card with cut shapes
wrapped around silver nitrate bottles and produced darkening giving a crude impression of these
shapes in the solution.
Work on the light sensitivity of silver chloride was continued by the great Swedish chemist Carl
Wilhelm Scheele (1742-86). In 1777 he correctly identified the reaction as producing metallic
silver and also found that the violet end of the spectrum was most effective, with the effect of red
light being almost imperceptible.
Scheele also made another vital observation that should have helped to produce a working
photo chemistry, but appears to have been overlooked. He found that silver chloride would
readily dissolve in ammonia, but that the black metallic silver was insoluble.
This enabled him to preserve his specimens after exposure. The sheets of paper he coated with
silver chloride were washed in ammonia and then dried. He had discovered a method of fixing
the images, but this was apparently overlooked by later workers.
Scheele's work was later confirmed in detail in 1782 by the experiments of Jean Senebier,
(1742-1809), who noted in his experiments that the time taken using the red rays was 20
minutes, while the violet rays needed only 15 seconds.
Senebier also discovered the effect of light on resins, finding that some lose their solubility in
turpentine after exposure to light: i.e. they harden
Title page to Elizabeth Fulhame’s An Essay on Combustion, With a View to a New Art of Dying and Painting, 1794.
In 1780 Fulhame experimented with means of producing patterns on cloth by the deposition of
gold and other metals, including through the action of light.
She explored the reduction of metals by light and the consequent formation of images.
Significantly for photography, she suggested making maps with rivers formed of silver by the
action of light - they could then be readily seen.
THOMAS WEDGWOOD AND SIR HUMPHREY DAVY
In 1802 Davy publishes his account of Wedgwood’s attempts at fixing camera obscura
images by the use of paper sensitized with silver nitrate.
Davy fails to recognize Scheele’s statement that ammonia dissolves silver chloride
unexposed to light.
William Henry Fox Talbot, Plant Specimen, 1840, photogenic drawing.
Photographic experiments by Thomas Wedgwood and Sir Humphrey
Davy probably resembled Talbot’s early photogenic drawings.
Wedgwood and Davy both succeeded in making copies of leaves, insects' wings, and the then
fashionable paintings on glass by simply laying them on paper or white leather sensitized with
silver nitrate or silver chloride, which Davy found more light-sensitive.
We know of no pictures by Wedgwood extant today. Some survived for a long time. But they
remained vulnerable to all but candlelight, for Wedgwood had failed to identify a fixer that would
make them truly permanent.
Photography could have appeared 40 years earlier.
THE HELIOGRAPH
C. Languiche, Portrait of Joseph Nicephore Niepce, ca. 1800, drawing.
1814 - 1816
Niepce attempts to make images with a camera obscura using silver chloride on paper.
Obtains negative images.
Abandons silver chloride because he can’t find a way to make the image positive and because he can’t make the print permanent. The images last only a short time. He, like Wedgwood, is unaware of the existence of hypo.
Is 1816 the true beginning of photography?
Niepce was enthralled with lithography, but he lacked the drawing skills the process required.
Originally, Niepce sought to automatically transfer an image to a lithography stone without
having to draw it.
- Hirsch, p.12
THE LITHOGRAPHIC PROCESS.
A smooth slab of limestone is drawn upon with lithographic ink, composed of pigment and fatty grease. It is applied with a pen, a brush, or with a litho crayon.
The stone is etched with acid. The grease of the crayon or ink and the acid together form a hard, resistant substance which adheres to the stone. The image is then washed off the stone with turpentine.
The stone moistened with water, which stays only in the non-greasy areas. When greasy ink is applied with a roller, it adheres only to the hardened areas that form the composition, and is repelled by the unworked areas of the stone.
A dampened piece of paper is applied, the stone and paper are put through a press, and a
lithograph is created.
The mutual repulsion of grease and water is the basis of all lithographic processes.
Honore Daumier, Rue Transnonain, April 15, 1834, 1834, lithograph.
1815 saw the introduction of lithography to France.
Meaning “stone-drawing”, it was invented in Germany in 1798.
It was the most popular print medium of the 19th century, providing illustrations for
books and newspapers.
It is very appropriate for mass media - a design can be easily transferred from the
original print to additional stones, allowing a large and rapid print edition to be made.
Joseph Nicephore Niepce, Cardinal D’Ambrose, ca. 1827,
heliographic print from an original engraving.
HELIOGRAPHY
Niepce used bitumen of judea, a varnish derived from asphalt. Although normally soluble in
turpentine, it is insoluble in turpentine after exposure to light.
A lithographic stone is coated with bitumen of judea dissolved in oil of lavender.
The plate is placed under a print and exposed to light.
The parts of the exposed plate not exposed to light are washed away by turpentine.
The parts exposed to light, and therefore hardened, remain on the plate.
The plate is then inked and printed in the same manner as a lithograph.
His vital discovery was that bitumen of Judea, a lithographer’s material made from asphaltum
(a natural tar pitch), was sensitive to light. Niepce knew bitumen of Judea was soluble in
lavender oil and would harden when exposed to light. His vital discovery was that bitumen of
Judea loses its solubility in lavender oil after exposure to light.
Niepce was able to take a paper engraving, place it in contact with the treated lithography stone,
and expose it to sunlight for about two hours. He then “developed” it in a solution of petroleum
and lavender oil, realizing the cultural dream of an “automatic” picture (although it was not
camera based.)
- Hirsch, p.12.
Nicephore Niepce’s camera, 1826.
1824 - 1826
Niepce uses his “Heliographic” process with a camera obscura.
He replaces the litho stone with a light weight pewter plate.
Joseph Nicephore Niepce, View from His Window at Le Gras, 1826-27, heliograph.
Niepce used a coated pewter plate rather than a litho stone.
The areas not affected by light were then dissolved using oil of lavender and white petroleum.
The light areas, then, were shown by the bitumen, the dark ones by the bare metal.
Heliography = direct positive.
It shows the view from Niepce's workroom window, with the pigeon-house on the left, a
pear-tree with a patch of sky showing through the branches, in the center the slanting
roof of the barn, and on the right another wing of the house. The appearance of
sunshine on both sides of the courtyard is due to the long exposure of about eight
hours on a summer's day.
Despite repeated attempts at finding support for his invention in France and England, Niepce’s invention didn’t catch on.
In 1825 L.J.M. Daguerre contacts Niepce and proposes a collaboration.
THE DAGUERREOTYPE
E. Thiesson, Louis Jacques Mande Daguerre, 1844, daguerreotype.
After a celebrated career as a stage designer. In 1822, with the painter
Charles-Marie Bouton, he opened an entire building called the diorama.
Anonymous, Vue du Chateau d’Eau Prise Boulevard St. Martin, ca. 1820, color etching.
Anonymous, Audience Viewing the “Port of Bolougne” at the Diorama, ca. 1835, lithograph.
Daguerre opened an entire building called the Diorama.
The exhibition of two 45 1/2 x 72 1/2 foot canvases.
The huge diorama paintings were remarkable achievements of optical illusion.
They were shown to an audience in a darkened auditorium in the specially designed diorama building.
Anonymous, Audience Viewing a Diorama, 1843, woodcut.
Each scenic picture was larger in width than a normal house lot--larger, in fact, than most
galleries devoted to photographic exhibitions today, and larger by far than most movie screens.
Each painting magically changed when carefully placed, filtered light from both in front of and behind the picture "decomposed" one or the other of several superimposed atmospheric or time-lapse "effects" on the same canvas."
The cycle went from dawn to dusk twice in a 30 minute show.
L.J.M. Daguerre, The Inauguration of the Temple of Solomon, 1836, ink and wash drawing.
The audience viewed 2 canvases, each 45 ft. high and 70 ft. long.
The audience of 350 was rotated, while sitting in their seats in the dark, from one scene to
another.
Eventually others were started in London, Edinborough, Berlin, and other cities.
No diorama canvases survive. The Paris diorama burned down in 1839.
It is almost impossible for us to imagine what this spectacle was like; the photographically
derived movie of today is the closest parallel we have to it.
View of a diorama showing the method of changing the illumination from front to back.
Louis Jacques Mande Daguerre, People Visiting a Romanesque Ruin, 1826, oil on canvas.
Niepce and Daguerre sharing secrets, 1831.
By the late 1820’s Niepce had revised his working techniques, to use silver-surfaced copper
plates to deliver a problematic, one-of-a-kind positive image that lacked full tonal range, had
excessive contrast, was hard to see, and required extensive time to make.
Niepce dies in 1833. Daguerre continues the work.
GENESIS OF DAGUERRE’S INVENTION.
1831 – Abandons Niepce’s asphalt varnish medium, concentrates on silver iodide.
1834 – Reverses the negative image into a positive one by fuming the plate with mercury vapors..
1835 - Discovery of the latent image.
1837 - Fixes the image with a solution of table salt.
1839 - The Daguerreotype process is made public
1840 - Faster lenses are introduced with maximum apertures of F3.6 instead of F16
1840 - more plate sensitivity is achieved with a second fuming of bromine or chlorine, reducing exposure times to a range of 10 seconds to 2 minutes.
1840 - gilding after fixing by fuming w/ gold chloride to deepen darks intensifying the image and providing a protective coating, making it less fragile.
1831 – DAGUERRE CONCENTRATES ON SILVER.
Daguerre discovered that the iodized areas of the silvered metal plates were extremely sensitive to light and from that point on, he devoted most of his experiments to working with this combination of materials, eventually discarding the asphalt varnish.
Silvered plates, fumed in the dark over iodine crystals (thus producing silver iodide) and then placed in the camera required relatively short exposures (about an hour in bright sun) to produce, without development, intense and highly detailed but tonally reversed (negative)
images.
1834 – REVERSES THE NEGATIVE IMAGE INTO A POSITIVE.
The next three years were devoted to finding a means of reversing the tonal structure of the
image.
For reasons no one has ever been able to explain, Daguerre began fuming his plates after
exposure with the vapors of heated mercury.
The results were astonishing; a delicate, exquisitely detailed, and highly finished picture formed on the plate.
The image consisted of a creamy white, fragile deposit of` a silver-mercury amalgam on those areas of the highly polished surface of the silvered plate that had been exposed to light.
The mercurial development also reduced the exposure to about twenty minutes in bright sun.
1835 - DISCOVERY OF THE LATENT IMAGE.
Daguerre put an exposed plate in his chemical cupboard, and some days later found, to his
surprise, that the latent image had developed.
Daguerre eventually concluded that this was due to the presence of mercury vapor from a
broken thermometer. This important discovery that a latent image could be developed made it possible to reduce the exposure time from some eight hours to thirty minutes.
Daguerre discovers the light sensitivity of silver iodide after lifting a spoon he
accidentally left on the surface of an iodized plate, 1831.
1837 - THE FIXED IMAGE.
Late in 1837 Daguerre discovered a simple means of stabilizing his pictures by bathing them in a strong solution of ordinary table salt. Later he switched to hypo.
The process was capable of' producing pictures that were relatively resistant to the darkening effects of light.
Louis Jacques Mande Daguerre, Still Life with Drape and Sculptures, 1837, daguerreotype.
The Daguerreotype process is made public in 1839.
THE MAKING OF A DAGUERREOTYPE
PREPARING THE PLATE
Remove a plate from the plate box (a).
If not pre-crimped in manufacture, use plate bender (b) to turn down edges. This takes less than a minute. Perfectly flat plates (c) were produced in the early years. Later, they were pre-bent at the edges (d) to aid insertion in a plate vice (i).
Remove buffing stick (e) from storage or warming box (f). Only one shown in this illustration, but each polishing agent gets its own buffer.
Vigorously scour the crimped plate (d) with powdered rotten stone (not illustrated) to remove surface imperfections.
Rub chalk rouge (g) on deerskin side of buffing stick (e).
Much more common was powdered rouge (h). Sprinkle on buffing stick and rub powder into surface of the hide (e).
Install plate in Benedict’s plate holder (i), one of many gadgets sold commercially for securing the plate while buffing.
The entire assembly is clamped onto a wooden table vise (j). The vise is fastened to the table or bench. Now polish or buff the plate (always in the horizontal direction of what will be the finished image) for about 20 minutes to get a perfect mirror finish. The use of a treadle driven buffing wheel could measurably shorted the time of this step.
Lime from these bottles (k) is used to bed or cradle the bromine in the bottom of the glass tray which is inside the second coating box (n).
Insert buffed plate (m), face down in the sliding cover which is double the length of the box, and slide the plate into position over box containing iodine (l). When the plate turns light yellow, (usually about 15 to 25 seconds) remove from this box. The iodine stays good for years when kept in its sealed coating box so it is always ready to be used.
Move the plate (m) to the bromine box (n) and slide into position for approximately 5 to 10 seconds till the plate turns rose colored. When this takes over 15 seconds, the bromine (or quick stuff) has weakened and a pinch more should be added to freshen up the existing chemical. It will then stay potent for months.
Now in darkness, return plate to the iodine box (l) for a few seconds. This completes the coating, and you now have a properly sensitized plate.
Insert polished and sensitized plate in a plateholder (o) and close dark-slide, (shown partially open in this illustration).
All polishing except for the quick final buff of the plate with lampblack (not illustrated) is done in advance so the sitter can enter the studio and receive a finished likeness in less than thirty minutes!
MAKING THE EXPOSURE
Place the camera (a) on a tripod.
Place the camera (a) on a tripod.
Open trap doors (b) and (c) on top of camera .
Remove lens cap (d) from front of lens (e).
Insert the ground viewing glass (f) in open slot on camera top.
Focus lens (e) and compose your subject in its frame until you are satisfied. This usually takes more time than the actual exposure. Lightly replace lens cap (d).
Remove the viewing glass (f) from camera (a) and replace with the loaded plateholder (g) with dark-slide (h) in down position.
Though in the illustrated detail of this layout, an extra plateholder (g&h) is displayed partially drawn up in order to show the polished and sensitized daguerreotype plate’s position (i) within the plateholder (g).
With the plateholder in the camera, pull up the dark-slide as far as possible (h2), then remove and replace the lens cap (d), using it as the shutter.
Normally indoors with good light this takes from ten to twenty seconds though most operators advertised much quicker exposure times to lure the gullable.
Drop the dark-slide (h2) to secure the exposed plate from any further light and remove the plateholder from the camera.
DEVELOPING, FIXING, AND GILDING THE DAGUERREOTYPE
Pour a small amount of mercury (a) into the cast iron fuming box (b).
In a vented dark room, light glass alcohol lamp (c).
Center the lamp on cast iron base under the bottom tip of inverted pyramid, slip thermometer (not illustrated) into the side slot (d) and heat mercury to approximately 175 degrees Fahrenheit.
With plate (e) face down on the heated fuming box (b), the image will develop by exposure to the fumes. This is where experience is necessary, since only trial and error can tell you when the plate is ready. In general this usually takes from 2 to 3 minutes.
In the glass tray (f) filled with hypo-sulfate, immerse plate face-up to arrest further chemical action. (This removes all the remaining light-sensitive chemicals).
Pour distilled water from bottle (g) over plate a few times in another tray to further remove unwanted chemicals.
Pour distilled water from bottle (g) over plate a few times in another tray to further remove unwanted chemicals.
Place plate (j) on gilding stand (h) and adjust screws to level the image so gold chloride won’t run off the plate when applied. This is more important with larger plates, since smaller plates can be leveled quite easily using hand pliers to grasp plate by its corner with no run off of liquid.
Light the Holmes Booth and Haydens brass spirit lamp (i) and gently pour on the gold chloride, which when heated, bonds to the silver image. This hardens the surface of the image (j) and makes it richer in tone.
HAND COLORING THE IMAGE
Open the coloring box and choose the appropriate bottles of finely powdered colors (a).
Install on palette (b) as needed. To mix colors use the white fabric interior of lid (c).
With a fine brush (d), sparingly stipple the dry color directly on the developed plate. Use squeeze bulb (not illustrated) to remove excess pigment.
A soft brush or cotton can be used to soften and blend the color applied to the cheeks. Some suggest breathing gently on the plate to make the dry powders adhere more readily.
The most common request is for tinting of the woman’s lips and cheeks. There are two extra cylindrical wood containers of powdered colors labeled "CARMINE" and "LADIES FLESH COLOR" (e) since they are in such high demand.
The two small enamel dishes (f) are for applying liquid gold or silver on the plate to accentuate jewelry, gold objects or gold braid on clothing.
The two small enamel dishes (f) are for applying liquid gold or silver on the plate to accentuate jewelry, gold objects or gold braid on clothing.
A small hand-punch tapped directly on the plate could be further used to accent diamonds, pearls or other jewelry. (Not illustrated)
Sixth plate daguerreotype (g), maker unknown, ca. 1853 of a man tinting an image using an outfit identical to the one in the illustration.
To its right is shown a tinted sixth plate daguerreotype (h), maker unknown, ca. 1853 of an actor, wearing a red and grey tunic adorned with gilded trimmings showing an example of both hand coloring and gilding.
PROTECTING, PRESERVING, AND PRESENTING THE DAGUERREOTYPE
Wafer a brass mat (b) between the image (a) and a glass rectangle of the same size (c) as shown in the exploded daguerreotype on left.
Remove proper amount of sealing paper from roll (d1). Apply glue to one side of sealing paper (d) and place around edge of the glass, then fold backwards and press on back of plate. It is now a sealed daguerreotype.
Remove frame-like mat preserver from open stack (e1) or one half gross box (e2) and encase and wrap around the sandwiched layers of image, mat, glass and seal. Mat preservers first came into common usage ca. 1847.
From rear it should now look like (f). From front it should look like (g).
Insert in case (h) and present to recipient. Please note that usually the velvet or satin is on the left (i) and the image is inserted on the right (j).
- taken from Mirror with a Memory: The American Daguerreotype.
http://www.ccsd.ca/charlotte/dagazine/mi/exhibit/index.htm
Giroux daguerreotype camera, n.d.
DAGUERREOTYPE SIZES
Whole-plate - 6 1/2 x 8 1/2 “
Half-plate - 4 1/4 x 5 1/2 “
Quarter-plate - 3 1/4 x 4 1/4”
Sixth-plate - 2 3/4 x 3 1/4 “
Louis Jacques Mande Daguerre, Still Life, 1839, daguerreotype.
Louis Jacques Mande Daguerre, Boulevard du Temple, ca. 1839, daguerreotype.
Louis Jacques Mande Daguerre, Boulevard du Temple, detail, ca. 1839, daguerreotype.
Louis Jacques Mande Daguerre, Boulevard du Temple, ca. 1839, daguerreotype.
Maurisset, Fantasies: Daguerreotypomania, 1839, lithograph.
DAGUERREOTYPOMANIA
Since Daguerre did not patent the daguerreotype in the United States, there were no restrictions on its practice, which proliferated here more than in any other country.
By the middle of the 1850s, an estimated three million daguerreotypes had been made.
It was the first practical photo medium, becoming primarily an American art form.
It enjoyed only two decades of popularity.
In New York City in 1851 there were 71 galleries with 127 operators.
THE DAGUERREOTYPE
Transformed not only the nature of art but it transformed the entire world.
Comparable to the invention of writing.
Self-contained medium, a unique art form separate from photography with a strikingly unique
appearance.
Not like any other photographic medium, a precursor and almost a separate medium.
Aesthetically different (doesn't look like a photograph), structurally unique.
Primarily a portrait medium
Anonymous, Daguerreotypist, ca. 1850, half-plate daguerreotype.
WEAKNESSES:
The pictures could not be reproduced and were therefore unique.
The surfaces were extremely delicate, which is why they are often found housed under glass in a case.
The image was reversed laterally, the sitter seeing himself as he did when looking at a mirror.
The chemicals used (bromine and chlorine fumes and hot mercury) were highly toxic.
The images were difficult to view from certain angles.
Anonymous, Daguerreotypist, ca. 1850, half-plate daguerreotype.
What a spectacle! In whatever direction you turn your peering gaze, you see naught but human
faces! There they stretch, from floor to ceiling--hundreds of them.
Ah! what tales might those pictures tell if their mute lips had the power of speech! How romance
then, would be infinitely outdone by fact. Here is one now a handsome female, apparently in a
bridal dress.
She was then, perhaps, just married. Her husband has brought her to get her likeness; and a fine
one he must have had, if this is a correct duplicate of it. Is he yet the same tender husband?
Another, near by, is the miniature of an aged matron, on whose head many winters have
deposited their snowy semblance. But what a calm serene bearing! How graceful she looks in her
old age!
. . Besides these, of course, are hundreds of others.
Indeed, it is little else on all sides of you, than a great legion of human faces--human eyes
gazing silently but fixedly upon you, and creating the impression of an immense Phantom
concourse-speechless and motionless, but yet realities.
You are indeed in a new world--a peopled world, though mute as the grave.
We don't know how it is with others, but we could spend days in that collection, and find enough
enjoyment in the thousand human histories, involved in those daguerreotypes.
Walt Whitman, from Visit to Plumbe’s Gallery, July 2, 1846.
Anonymous, New England Town Scene, ca. 1847, half-plate daguerreotype.
When taken out, the plate does not at first appear to have received a definite impression--some
short processes, however, develop it in the most miraculous beauty.
All language must fall short of conveying any just idea of the truth, and this will not appear so
wonderful when we reflect that the source of vision itself has been, in this instance, the designer.
Perhaps, if we imagine the distinctness with which an object is reflected in a positively perfect
mirror, we come as near the reality as by any other means.
For, in truth, the Daguerreotyped plate is infinitely (we use the term advisedly) is infinitely more
accurate in its representation than any painting by human hands.
If we examine a work of ordinary art, by means of a powerful microscope, all traces of
resemblance to nature will disappear--but the closest scrutiny of the photogenic drawing
discloses only a more absolute truth, a more perfect identity of aspect with the thing
represented.
The variations of shade, and the gradations of both linear and aerial perspective are those of
truth itself in the supremeness of its perfection.
- Edgar Allen Poe, 1840
John Adams Whipple, The Moon, 6 August 1851, quarter-plate daguerreotype.
Félix-Jacques-Antoine Moulin,Two Nudes Standing, ca. 1850. Daguerreotype.
A. LeBlondel, Post Mortem Picture, 1850, daguerreotype.
Anonymous (American), Man Assembling Daguerreotype Lockets, ca. 1850-55, daguerreotype.
Anonymous, Nude, 1852, stereoscopic daguerreotype.
Anonymous, A Domestic Servant, ca. 1850, daguerreotype.
John H. Fitzgibbon, Kno-Shr, Kansas Chief, 1853, daguerreotype.
Anonymous, Blacksmiths, ca. 1850, hand-tinted daguerreotype.
Although the photograph on paper has superceded the silver plate, yet, with many others,
consider the latter the best picture yet made with the camera.
Abraham Bogard, a leading American daguerreotypist,
in his The Lost Art of the Daguerreotype, 1904.
A plain daguerreotype picture, alone, in my opinion, surpasses in beauty, richness, multiplicity of
detail, and intrinsic value, any other kind of picture whatsoever. What an exalted art Daguerre
originated!
John Mascher, inventor or the stereoscpic daguerreotype case, 1858.
I confess that I frequently appraise my work by critical comparison with the daguerreotype
image; how urgently I desire to achieve that exquisite tonality and miraculous definition of light
and substance in my own prints.
- Ansel Adams, n.d.
Marcus Aurelius Root, Portrait of Albert Pritchard Root Asleep by the Flag,
ca. 1850, quarter-plate daguerreotype.
ARTISTRY
In unartistic hands will undoubtedly produce abortions, because the daguerreotypist must
observe all of the identical rules necessary of the production of a work of merit that a painter or
sculptor would follow to secure graceful position, proper distribution and degrees of light and
shade, also tone of picture, arangement of drapery, etc.
- Marcus Aurelius Root
SOUTHWORTH AND HAWES
Southworth & Hawes, Bridal Portrait, 1855, daguerreotype.
Southworth and Hawes, Portrtait of a Young Girl, 1852. Daguerreotype.
Southworth and Hawes, Winter Portrait with Fur Coat and Gloves, 1853. Daguerreotype.
Southworth and Hawes, Woman in Floral Bonnet and Zig-Zag Dress, 1854. Daguerreotype.
Southworth and Hawes, Vignette With a Black Background, n.d. Daguerreotype.
Southworth and Hawes, Lemuel Shaw, 1850. Daguerreotype.
Southworth and Hawes, Rollin Heber Neal, 1850. Daguerreotype
Southworth and Hawes, Untitled, ca. 1850. Daguerreotype.
Southworth and Hawes, Alice Mary Hawes, 1852. Daguerreotype.
Southworth & Hawes, Young Girl, Hand on Shoulder, n.d., whole-plate daguerreotype.
Southworth & Hawes, Lola Montez, 1851, whole-plate daguerreotype.
Josiah Johnson Hawes, Albert Sands Southworth, ca. 1848, half-plate daguerreotype.
Southworth & Hawes, Girl Facing Chair Back, 1855, daguerreotype.
Josiah Johnson Hawes, the artist.
Albert Sands Southworth, the promoter.
An ideal partnership
Southworth's public relations and promotional ability and his connections brought the influential, the powerful, the rich, and the famous to the studio in Boston.
Hawes handled most of the photography. An advertisement read: ”One of the partners is a
practical artist, and as we never employ operators, customers receive our personal attention.”
The subtlety and sophistication of their work went beyond any other Daguerreian images of their time.
Hawes was a consistent master in three areas: lighting, composition, and posing.
An unusually large number of full plates was produced by the firm.
Most Daguerreian artists shied away from the full-plate size (whole-plate-size images, 6 1/2 x 8 1/2 inches, represent far less than 1 percent of the total output) for numerous reasons:
Clientele could not afford it.
Large equipment, camera, sensitizing and developing equipment too cumbersome.
Polishing the plate was much more difficult.
More thought went into a quality photograph in those years
Advanced preparation: hair, costume, jewelry, etc.
Proper plate preparation was a ceremony in itself, thus making each exposure far more
important.
Placed the person in the gray soft north light that filled the studio.
Placed props such as chairs, tables, columns, and rug which were all movable.
He determined the distance from his camera to the subject.
The composition required a thorough under standing of the spatial concepts of the plate about to be exposed.
Whether to come in close with the camera, thus filling the plate intimately, or to pull back with the camera and tripod, thus composing the portrait with more dignity and formality, reflecting the stylized portraiture of that time had to be considered with each plate.
The space between camera and client was in a direct relationship to how Hawes perceived his subjects,
How he felt they perceived themselves… sensitivity to people's moods.
The vertical placing of the camera - the subtlety of looking up or down at the subject, some at eye level, in the ground glass again changed the composition on the plate.
Posing, as opposed to composition, was the fine tuning of the portrait. For instance, the way hands were posed to describe still further the sitter's character - adolescent female hands were so delicately handled, men's hands were posed more rigidly, or grasping a book.
The male neck and head were set alert and sometimes even firm, while the female neck and head were usually turned and relaxed.
Naturalism in posing.
LIGHT
The way light fell upon the subject itself. Just as important--and very advanced for its time -- was the masterful way background lighting was controlled from light to dark.
Through a series of backgrounds, shades, reflectors, and diffusers, the background lighting was always in contrast to the subject, thereby giving a depth to the portraits unequalled by any other artist of that day. For example, dark hair could be highlighted with a very light background, while light skin tones could be contrasted with a darker background, all of this in the same Daguerreotype.
TONALITY
The presence of the gray scale was much more prominent in Southworth and Hawes Daguerreotypes than in the much harsher black-and-white images of other operators.
When personality, pose, or demeanor called for high contrast to describe a sitter's inner self, that plate shifted from shades of gray to stark black and white - through a change in time of exposure, time of development, or both.
The strength of presence is so overwhelming and so powerful that a modern-day viewer is transported and feels as if he or she were present in the studio during the actual sitting.
No other Daguerreian artist achieved this with such consistency
The combination of subject lighting and skillful back-lighting no doubt reflected Hawes's discipline through years of portrait painting with oils and his appreciation of fine art.
He advised that very element of the craft must be internalized so that, in Hawes’ words:
“What is to be done is obliged to be done quickly. The whole character of the sitter is to be read at first sight. . . “
Southworth & Hawes, Niagra Falls, 1853, daguerreotype.
THE CALOTYPE PROCESS
Camera lucida with eye piece and equipment box, n.d..
Cornelius Varley, Artist Sketching with a Wollaston Style Camera Lucida, 1830, engraving.
Phil Sayer, David Hockney Drawing with a Camera Lucida, 1999, gelatin silver print, from
Hockney’s book - Secret Knowledge - rediscovering the lost techniques of the old masters.
Camera lucida in operation.
Invented by John Wollaston as a drawing aid in 1807.
Used by Herschel and Talbot as a drawing instrument.
The camera lucida was little more than a small prism perched at the top of an adjustable brass stem.
It was a brilliantly simple device, so simple, in fact, that its invention was inspired by a crack in Wollaston's shaving mirror.
The artist would mount the camera on his drawing board, looking down on the prism while adjusting the angle until nature's scene was reflected to his eye.
.
By shifting the position of the eye very slightly to the edge of the prism, the drawing paper below would come into view.
When the alignment was just right, part of the pupil would gather the reflected scene and part would see the paper.
Because of the proximity of the prism, these two images would fuse into one.
Compared to the camera obscura, the camera lucida was smaller and lighter, had no optical distortion, and took in a wider field of view.
Wollaston's solid quadrilateral glass prism was a good choice; reflected twice, the image was kept in correct orientation. Mirror and lens surfaces are only partly efficient.
The internal surfaces of a prism are virtually perfect reflectors, losing none of the light.
Unlike the inescapable distorting effect of the curved surfaces of a lens, the flat surfaces of a prism kept the image inviolate.
Objects at any distance were equally in focus.
The effect of wide-angle or telephoto lenses could be achieved by simply changing the extension of the tube.
Jean Auguste Dominique Ingres, Madame Louis-Francois Godinot, 1829, pencil drawing.
Sir John Herschel, Tivoli: Principa Fall and Temple of Vesta, 1824, camera lucida pencil drawing.
Sir John Herschel, Ruins of the Abbey of St. Bertin, St. Omer, 1829 camera lucida pencil drawing.
William Henry Fox Talbot, Villa Melzi, 1833, camera lucida pencil drawing.
William Henry Fox Talbot, The Pencil of Nature, cover, 1844.
… And this led me to reflect on the inimitable beauty of the pictures of
nature's painting which the glass lens of the camera throws upon the
paper in its focus, fair pictures, creations of a moment, and destined as
rapidly to fade away.
It was during these thoughts that the idea occurred to me ... how charming
it would be if it were possible to cause these natural images to imprint
themselves durably, and remain fixed upon the paper!
The picture, divested of the ideas which accompany it,
and considered only in its ultimate nature, is but a succession
or variety of stronger lights thrown upon one part of the
paper, and of deeper shadows on another.
Now light, where it exists, can exert an action, and, in certain
circumstances, does exert one sufficient to cause changes in material bodies.
Suppose, then, such an action could be exerted on the paper;
and suppose the paper could be visibly changed by it.
In that case surely some effect must result having a general
resemblance to the cause which produced it.
So that the variegated scene of light and shade might leave its
Image or impression behind, stronger or weaker on different
parts of the paper according to the strength or weakness of
the light which had acted there.
William Henry Fox Talbot, from his book, The Pencil of Nature, 1844.
William Henry Fox Talbot, Botanical Specimen, 1835, photogenic drawing negative fixed in salt.
Talbot started with the well-known light sensitive property of silver nitrate.
He was soon disappointed with how little sensitivity it actually possessed.
Freshly prepared silver chloride fared no better.
Like Wedgwood, Talbot made his sensitive sheets by first brushing writing paper with common salt.
He then brushed on a solution of silver nitrate, which reacted with the salt in the paper to form light sensitive silver chloride.
Although the paper was fairly insensitive, the edges sometimes darkened more quickly.
He isolated the cause of this effect to the fact that, when applying the salt, the edges often received a haphazard treatment
The salt was absolutely necessary to the process. Salt increased sensitivity.
But a lesser quantity produced a greater effect.
He had increased the sensitivity to the point where images could be formed.
Talbot reasoned that a very strong solution of salt should have the opposite effect and render the paper almost totally insensitive.
The same substance, salt, when weak sensitized the paper to light, and when strong preserved it from further action.
He had invented a working photographic process.
W.H. Fox Talbot, Two delicate plant fronds, 1839. Photogenic Drawing.
PHOTOGENIC DRAWINGS
(Salted paper print or salt print)
Writing paper is coated with salt and dried.
It is recoated with silver nitrate, forming silver chloride.
The coated paper is exposed to light, darkening where it is exposed.
The print is then “fixed” in a salt solution, which dissolves the unexposed silver
chloride.
The completed print is a negative image.
W. H. Fox Talbot, Lace, 1844, photogenic drawing.
Talbot's first photographs were photograms: direct contact images made under an object such as a leaf or a bit of lace.
The sensitized sheet of paper was placed under an object in a printing frame and put out in the sun.
The length of exposure required depended on the quality of the sunlight, the opacity and color of the object, and the precise chemistry involved
Printing times on the order of fifteen minutes would have been typical.
This very substantial exposure was required because the reduction of the print would partially bleach in the fixing bath so the matter of exposure called for some judgment.
W. H. Fox Talbot, Flowers, Leaves, and Stems, 1838, photogenic drawing.
Silver Printing-Out Papers
THE CALOTYPE PROCESS
One of Fox Talbot’s “mousetraps”, a 2 1/2 x 3” sliding-box camera.
W. H. Fox Talbot camera, ca. 1840.
Talbot’s cameras (“mousetraps”) were only 2 1/2 inches square.
He took tiny views of his house, Lacock Abbev in Wiltshire, on silver chloride paper with an exposure of half an hour.
They were fixed with common salt.
The earliest extant paper negative was taken in August 1835 and shows the window of the
library at Lacock Abbey.
Pictures taken in the camera were too slow, too small, and not good enough technically compared with the brilliant detail of the Daguerreotype.
William Henry Fox Talbot, Roofline of Lacock Abbey, 1840, salt print from a calotype negative.
W.H. Fox Talbot, Cloisters, Lacock Abbey, 1843, calotype negative.
NEGATIVE - POSITIVE
In the photogenic or sciagraphic process, if the paper is transparent, the first drawing may
serve as an object, to produce a second drawing, in which the lights and shadows would be
reversed.
Here Talbot grasped the idea of using a negative to make a positive.
THE LATENT IMAGE
In 1840 Talbot discovered the latent image by the use of gallic acid applied to an exposed but
not visible image. The gallic acid acts as a “developer” which brings out the invisible, or latent,
image.
Good quality writing paper was coated successively with solutions of silver nitrate and potassium iodide, forming silver iodide.
Then further sensitized with solutions of gallic acid and silver nitrate.
After exposure the latent image was developed with a further application of gallo-nitrate solution, which had the same function as the mercury developer in the Daguerreotype.
The picture became visible when the paper was warmed by the fire for one or two minutes.
The negative was fixed with hypo and rinsed with water.
The positive print was made on photogenic paper.
Silver Developing-Out Papers
In the developing out process, the exposed silver halide crystals, which form a latent image, are converted to blackened metallic silver.
The unexposed silver halide crystals are rendered water soluble, by immersion in hypo, and
washed away.
Cross-section of black and white negative emulsions, developed to different densities.
Magnified 2500X.
W.H. Fox Talbot, The Haystack, 1844, calotype negative.
THE CALOTYPE PROCESS
Talbot's process had, by1841, reached the same speed as Daguerre's had with chemical acceleration.
It offered the great advantage that any number of positive prints could be made.
It is this negative - positive principle on which modern photography is based, whereas the Daguerreotype, which produced a single picture, was a cul-de-sac in photography.
William Henry Fox Talbot, Experimental portrait, ca.1841, calotype negative. Thirty second exposure in evening shade.
William Henry Fox Talbot, The Stable Court, Lacock Abbey, 1840-41, calotype negative. Colors created by variations in chemistry and light.
William Henry Fox Talbot, The Open Door, salt print from calotype negative. 1844-46.
Talbot’s image selections illustrate his belief that subject matter is “subordinate to the
exploration of space and light.” The calotype excelled in such explorations while securing the
ethereal nuances of light reflected by objects.
In the text to The Open Door, Talbot compares vernacular photographic realism, the forerunner
of the snapshot, to Dutch genre painting, and reveals his allegiance to the Romantic picturesque
landscape conventions:
“We have sufficient authority in the Dutch school of art for taking as subjects of representation
scenes of daily and familiar occurrence. A painter’s eye will often be arrested where ordinary
people see nothing remarkable.
“A casual gleam of sunshine, or a shadow thrown across his path, a time-withered oak, or a
moss-covered stone may awaken a train of thoughts and feelings, and picturesque imaginings.”
-Talbot, quoted in Hirsch, pp. 52-53
William Henry Fox Talbot, Carpenters on the Lacock Estate,
1842, salt print from a calotype negative.
W. H. Fox Talbot, The Photographer’s Daughter, Rosamunde, ca. 1843, salt print from a calotype negative..
W. H. Fox Talbot, New Court, St. John’s College, Cambridge, ca.1845, waxed calotype negative.
William Henry Fox Talbot, The Hungerford Suspension Bridge, 1845, salt print from a calotype negative.
W.H. Fox Talbot, Beech Trees at Lacock, ca. 1840. Salt print.
W.H. Fox Talbot, Trees Reflected in Water, ca. 1840. Salt print.
William Henry Fox Talbot, Honeysuckle, ca. 1840, salt print from a calotype negative.
William Henry Fox Talbot, Sir Walter Scott’s Monument, Edinburgh, as it appeared when nearly finished, 1844, salt print from a calotype negative.
William Henry Fox Talbot, The Footman, 1840, waxed calotype negative. Waxing increased the transparency of the negative.
William Henry Fox Talbot, The Reading Establishment, ca. 1846, salt prints from two calotype negatives.
SIR JOHN HERSCHEL
(1792 - 1871)
SIR JOHN HERSCHEL
Experiments:
Platinum as a photographic medium.
Color photography.
Waxed paper negative.
Invented:
Cyanotype (blueprint) - iron based.
Argentotype (Van Dyck brown, kallitype) - iron & silver based.
Chrysotype (gold print) - iron based.
Originated:
The use of hypo (sodium thiosulphate) to fix a silver based image.
The use of glass as a negative support rather than paper.
The terms - hypo, photograph, snapshot.
Sir John Herschel, Photograph Made with the Juice of the Petals of Mathiola Annua, 1841.
Experimented in using juices of plants to filter light.
Experimented in bleaching effect of sunlight on flower juices to
produce specific tints under certain wavelengths of light.
Never completed his work.
Cross section of a three layered color negative film.
His method very similar to that used in color prints today.
A primary color of light would affect a certain color layer,
bleaching a particular color of floral dye.
By superimposing different colored layers with sensitivities to
different primary colors, a full color picture could be built up.
Sir John Herschel,Sheet of experimental photographs of the spectrum, 1840-41.
Sir John Herschel’s research notes with a Talbot photogenic drawing fixed in hypo.
Sir John Herschel’s research notes demonstrating the effects of different colors of light on various photographically sensitive substances.
Sir John Herschel, Copy of an engraving, 1842, positive cyanotype.
Anna Atkins, Laminaria Saccharina, 1843, cyanotype shadowgraph. Illustration to her book, British Algae: Cyanotype Impressions.
Anna Atkins, Halycirys Siliquosa, 1843, cyanotype shadowgraph. Illustration to her book, British Algae: Cyanotype Impressions.
Anna Atkins, Festuca Ovina, 1854, cyanotype shadowgraph. Illustration to her book, British Algae: Cyanotype Impressions.
CYANOTYPE
(Blue print, Prussian blue)
Iron based process invented in1842.
Part of Herschel's color experimentation
Cyanotype was the first successful non-silver photographic printing process.
It was used for the first photographically illustrated book, and later became popular with some pictorialists, for whom a commercial paper, called ferro-prussiate, was marketed.
CYANOTYPE
(Blue print, Prussian blue)
Simple, cheap, and permanent.
It also enjoyed an extended period of commercial success as the blueprint process for copying drawing-office plans, until it was made obsolete by the invention of dry, plain paper photocopying.
The word 'blueprint' still persists in our language, however, with an expanded meaning.
Ferric ammonium citrate and potassium ferricyanide solution is brushed or soaked onto paper and dried
The coated paper is contact printed in sunlight, producing a weak green image.
The print is rinsed in water, washing away unexposed iron salts, and reducing the remaining iron salts to a permanent, insoluble prussian blue.
It fades somewhat but can be rejuvenated.
Henri LeSecq, Rustic Scene, ca. 1850, cyanotype.
Frances Johnston, Snow Hill Institute, 1902, cyanotype.
Sir John Herschel, Specimen of chrysotype, or aurophotography, 1842, gold-based negative on paper.
Sir John Herschel, The framework of William Herschel’s forty-foot telescope, shortly before dismantling, 1839, salt based paper negative.
Sir John Herschel, The framework of William Herschel’s forty-foot telescope, shortly before dismantling, 1839, silver chloride negative on glass.
HIPPOLYTE BAYARD’S DIRECT POSITIVE PAPER PROCESS
Hippolyte Bayard, Still Life with Statuettes, 1839, direct positive print.
Hippolyte Bayard, Montmarte, Windmills, 1839, direct positive print.
Hippolyte Bayard, Self-Portrait as a Drowned Man, 1840, direct paper positive.
Experimenting during his time off from his job as a civil servant, Hippolyte Bayard purportedly
invented photography earlier than Louis-Jacques Mandé Daguerre in France and William Henry
Fox Talbot in England, the two men traditionally credited with its invention.
Bayard was reportedly persuaded by a friend of Daguerre to postpone the announcement of his
findings, thus missing the opportunity to be recognized as the inventor of the medium. In 1840
he responded to this injustice by creating perhaps the first example of political-protest
photography, a portrait of himself as a drowned man, upon which he wrote:
The corpse which you see here is that of M. Bayard, inventor of the process that has
just been shown to you.
As far as I know this indefatigable experimenter has been occupied for about three
years with his discovery.
The Government which has been only too generous to Monsieur Daguerre, has said
it can do nothing for Monsieur Bayard, and the poor wretch has drowned himself.
Oh the vagaries of human life....!
... He has been at the morgue for several days, and no-one has
recognized or claimed him.
He continues:
Ladies and gentlemen, you'd better pass along for fear of offending your
sense of smell, for as you can observe, the face and hands of the
gentleman are beginning to decay.
In fact Bayard did not drown himself but continued to photograph until his
death nearly fifty years later..
BAYARD’S DIRECT POSITIVE PAPER PROCESS.
Thinking that a direct positive image was advantageous, Bayard devised a direct positive
paper process:
The paper is sensitized in silver chloride (as with Talbot) and dried.
It is then blackened by exposure to light, and soaked in bleach.
It is exposed in a camera - the exposed areas lighten (reversal.)
Then it is fixed, washed , and dried.
It had the disadvantages of both the Daguerreotype and the Calotype:
Direct positive = one of a kind, could not be reproduced.
Paper supported image less beautiful than the daguerreotype.
Hippolyte Bayard, Bayard in the Dorrway of a House, ca. 1847, salt print.
Hippolyte Bayard, Self-Portrait in the Garden, 1847. Salt print.
Camille Corot, Landscape, ca. 1858, cliché-verre.
FIRST IMPERMANENT NEGATIVE IMAGES
Elizabeth Fulhame - sensitizing fabric with gold and silver.
Thomas Wedgwood and Sir Humphrey Davy - silver nitrate plates in camera obscuras.
Nicephore Niepce - experiments with silver chloride in camera obscuras.
FIRST IMPERMANENT NEGATIVE IMAGES
Elizabeth Fulhame - sensitizing fabric with gold and silver.
Thomas Wedgwood and Sir Humphrey Davy - silver nitrate plates in camera obscuras.
Nicephore Niepce - experiments with silver chloride in camera obscuras.
FIRST PERMANENT NEGATIVE IMAGES
Nicephore Niepce - fixed silver chloride negative images .
Sir John Herschel - platinum, gold, cyanotype, and color experiments.
W.H. Fox Talbot - photogenic drawing.
Anna Atkins - cyanotypes.
FIRST IMPERMANENT NEGATIVE IMAGES
Elizabeth Fulhame - sensitizing fabric with gold and silver.
Thomas Wedgwood and Sir Humphrey Davy - silver nitrate plates in camera obscuras.
Nicephore Niepce - experiments with silver chloride in camera obscuras.
FIRST PERMANENT NEGATIVE IMAGES
Nicephore Niepce - fixed silver chloride negative images .
Sir John Herschel - platinum, gold, cyanotype, and color experiments.
W.H. Fox Talbot - photogenic drawing.
Anna Atkins - cyanotypes.
FIRST PERMANENT POSITIVE IMAGES
Direct Positive Reversal
Nicephore Niepce - heliography (non-silver.)
Hippolyte Bayard - silver chloride direct paper positive.
L.J.M. Daguerre - daguerreotype.
Negative/Positive
W.H. Fox Talbot - calotype process (calotype paper negative and salt print positive.)