Photo 1 Lecture 13

Artistic Arguments

Lady Clementina Hawarden. Photographic Study. c. 1863.
http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_xCykdpQhXe8/TR-JinF9-rI/AAAAAAAAQ3s/iX_T9yFjA7Q/s1600/lady%2Bclementina%2Bhawarden.jpg

Youthful Photography Supplying Painting with an Additional Brush

Oscar Rejlander. Youthful Photography Supplying Painting with an Additional Brush. c. 1856.
http://www.getty.edu/art/collections/images/m/04627601.jpg

"The photograph cannot deceive; there is no power in this marvelous machine either to add or to take from: we know what we see must be true." - 1860 article in Art Journal

1839 Paul Delaroche declared "from this day, painting is dead"
in reference to the newly announced daguerreotype

Arguments against photography's artistic merits:

Machines cannot create art

Art should be grand and dramatic, not realistic

Photography reduced art to common materials and anyone could do it

Painters feared that photography would make their media obsolete

Charles Baudelaire On Photography	Nadar. Portrait of Charles Baudelaire. 1863. Stokstad, Marilyn. Art History. Revised Second ed. Vol. 2. New York: Prentice Hall Inc., and Harry N. Abrams Inc., 2005.

Photography had become "the refuge of failed painters with too little talent"
"I am convinced that the badly applied advances of photography, like all purely material progress for that matter, have greatly contributed to the impoverishment of French artistic genius."
"From that moment onwards, our loathsome society rushed, like Narcissus, to contemplate its trivial image on a metallic plate. A form of lunacy, an extraordinary fantaicism took hold of these new sun-worshippers."

Nadar
1820 - 1910

Nadar Self-Portrait

Nadar. Self-Portrait. c. 1855. Salt print.
Rosenblum, Naomi. A World History of Photography. Abbeville Press, New York. 1989.

Gaspard Felix Tournachon

"Tourne a dard" = one who stings

Nadar's aim in portraiture was to find "that instant of understanding that puts you in touch with the model - helps you sum him up, guides you to his habits, his ideas, and character and enables you to produce a really convincing and sympathetic likeness, an intimate portrait."
- A World History of Photography

Sarah Bernhardt

Nadar. Sarah Bernhardt. 1865. Albumen.
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/7/7f/Nadar_2.jpg/482px-Nadar_2.jpg


Nadar. Sarah Bernhardt. 1865. Albumen print. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Nadar_1.jpg	Napoleon Sarony. Sarah Bernhardt. c. 1880. Albument print. Newhall, Beaumont. The History of Photography. The Museum of Modern Art, New York. 1982.

Nadar considered himself a "daredevil, always on the lookout for currents to swim against."

Nadar "elevating photography to the condition of art", 1862, Honoré Daunier.
This caricature appeared in Le Boulevard on 25 May, 1862.
http://arch.ced.berkeley.edu/kap/1997_images/Background/History/nadar.jpg

Aerial View of Paris

Nadar. The Arc de Triumph and the Grand Boulevards, Paris, from a Baloon. 1868.
Rosenblum, Naomi. A World History of Photography. Abbeville Press, New York. 1989.

Nadar. The Catacombs. 1861 - 62.
http://www.masters-of-photography.com/images/screen/nadar/nadar_catacombs.jpg

More Nadar images

Oscar G. Rejlander
1813 - 1875

Study of muscles in the face and emotion

Duchenne de Boulogne. Study of muscles in the face and emotion. 1852-56.
Koetzle, Hans-Michael. Photo Icons: The Story Behind the Pictures . Volume 1. Koln: Taschen, 2002. 2 vols.

Pensive Young Girl

Oscar Rejlander. Pensive Young Girl. c. 1860.
http://www.geh.org/fm/rejlander/htmlsrc/m197202490002_jpg.html

Two Ways of Life

Oscar G. Rejlander. Two Ways of Life. 1857. Albumen silver print. 16" X 31".
http://www.museeniepce.com/catalogues/paralleles/middle/1986.116.232P01B.jpg

Women in center of Two Ways of Life
http://www.photogravure.com/photogravure_images/medium/Rejlander_01.jpg

separate negatives used in Two Ways of Life
http://www.cotianet.com.br/photo/great/Images/plus02/rejlander%20grafico.jpg

School of Athens

Raphael. School of Athens. c. 1510-11.
Stokstad, Marilyn. Art History. Revised Second ed. Vol. 2. New York: Prentice Hall Inc., and Harry N. Abrams Inc., 2005.

"I am tired of photography-for-the-public, particularly composite photographs, for there can be
no gain and there is no honour, only cavil and misrepresentation." - Oscar Rejlander in 1859

Fading Away

Henry Peach Robinson. Fading Away. 1858. Albumen silver print.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Fading_Away.jpg

Photographic Societies & Amateur Photo Clubs

1858 Photography Exhibition

1858 Photography exhibition
Bajac, Quentin. The Invention of Photography. Harry N. Abrams, Inc., New York. 2002.

Photographic societies provided:

Organized exhibitions of photographic works

Published magazines and newsletters with how-to information and scholarly discussion of theory

Community of people who believed and defended the artistic virtues of photography

Support and encouragement to the amateur and hobbyist

Lady Clementina Hawarden
1822 - 1865

Photographic Study

Lady Clementina Hawarden. Photographic Study. Early 1860s. Albumen silver print.

Lady Clementina Hawarden. Clementina Maude. c. 1862.
http://www.vam.ac.uk/images/image/25629-popup.html

Lady Clementina Hawarden. Daughters on a Balcony. c. 1865.
http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_nIZprbnXL-s/TPhsdrX455I/AAAAAAAARzY/myG7zu9edF4/s1600/Clementina_01.jpg

In 1861, the age of consent was raised from 10 to 12 in England

While there is no evidence that Hawarden was deliberately exploring the topic of adolescent sexuality, the popular concern is arguably evident in her images

Lady Clementina Hawarden. Isabella Grace and Clementina Maude. c. 1863.
http://www.vam.ac.uk/images/image/25701-popup.html