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The Daguerreotype: Custodian of the shadow
By Shaun Caton
Being some thoughts on daguerreotypes and aesthetics in the 1840's and now.
" 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."
Edgar Allan Poe (1809-49) The Oval Portrait
Looking at my computer screen at a reproduction of a daguerreotype I attempt to simulate the unique negative/positive interchange caused by holding the image at various angles in actuality. The representation on the screen darkens and lightens according to the position of my glance and the strain of neck muscles. Invariably, the simulacrum does not have the lustrous beauty of an original daguerreotype, but when inspected from extreme slants will dissolve into ghostly effulgence, an ectoplasmic trace of the image, forming and reforming itself within the confines of the monitor. Sunlight flooding the surface of the screen obliterates the effigy instantaneously and I wait a few seconds for a passing cloud to ameliorate the harsh light and tempt the shadow back into the frame.
When beholding actual vintage daguerreotypes I have discovered that early morning light is best - I have many examples displayed on bookshelves facing two multi-paned sash windows (built around 1839-40). The light pouring through these distorted and irregular panes is mottled and at around 7.30am provides the perfect antidote to electrical illumination by lamps, spotlights, fluorescent strips and other such phenomena. Nocturnal study of daguerreotypes seems to reiterate their phantasmagorical allure: when the lights are dimmed the likeness vanishes completely leaving only a glinting rectangle in the subdued light. The occupants in these pictures have fled again into the dead zone and we have no further communion with them until the circumstance of the lighting condition is just right.
What we see here is not what we habitually 'get'. I was told that people in the Daguerreian era would view daguerreotypes by candlelight. I too have tried this but found the glare of the flame reflected in the plate too lambent to pick out any of the magnificent tones and depth of contrast in the daguerreotype. I conclude that viewing by lit taper must be a poetic ruse inspired by the florid penmanship of latter day Dickens impersonators - such myths are common amongst dreamers who collect these mysterious traces.
Holding a daguerreotype underneath an electric lamp with a 40 watt bulb also has the tendency to bleach out much of the acumen inherent in the image, including the mastery of the tinting, which is usually painted onto the surface of the image. So the pale morning light streaming through the windows is the best light to enjoy these elusive portraits out of another time - which we study through the additional grubby portal of the cased image.
Recently a friend who was staying with me fell asleep in the room where many of my daguerreotypes are displayed. He reported that he had awoken early in the morning (2am) and the room was still lit by a single Art Deco globe lamp. With some trepidation he told me that the phantoms in the photographs had revealed themselves to him in his soporific state - changing from negatives into positives or 'coming alive momentarily'. He had never seen such fantastic and reflective photographs that gave the illusion of life held in suspended animation. I have been collecting people's responses and reactions to viewing daguerreotypes for the duration of my relationship with these likenesses and find it useful, if not humorous, and illuminating research. It enables me to evaluate how a person in 2004 looks at a photographic image made in 1844.
Watching people shuffle unwittingly past daguerreotypes in museums is equally engaging and peculiarly revealing. Some are startled by the appearance of their own visage in the mirror-like surface of the daguerreotype and cannot work out if the photograph is a mirror, a holograph, or some kind of trick photograph. Others are beguiled by the 'otherness' of the sitter, who appears there before them recorded in minute detail, seemingly more real than any other type of photograph - having been delivered to us through an unknowable series of transactions, exchanges and the accrued passage of time.
Having fleetingly cohabited with the ghosts of previous owners whether actual or fictional the daguerreotype finds new significance and custody in the eyes of collectors and self-proclaimed 'scholars' heaving under the immense weight of their magnificently illustrated tomes, festooned with clanking medallions, diplomas, honours, and the lure of the ultimate coffee table publication which puts their collected micro-philosophy into commercial 'perspective' and singularly marks them out as a gifted interpreter of the daguerreotype. Walter Benjamin (the first real philosophical poet to undertake a brief history of photography in the 1930's) gorge your heart out!
There has never been so much interest in the daguerreotype, especially in the USA where the beacon of truth is 'drawn' on a million plates for us to marvel and examine ad infinitum. All hail to the great industrial engine of the United States who were far in advance (and excess) of England or Europe in the production of commercial daguerreotypes during the middle period of the 19th Century. The evocative/emotive truth in reading the daguerreotype is in the way we 'see' these 'little shining pictures' and how we imbue each in turn with new life. We must not only learn to see these images properly but also to breathe energy and imagination into them.
A heavy purple bound (marbled) book of English engravings from the early 1840's offers the viewer valuable insight into the art and aesthetics of the period. These albums were generally mass produced for a predominantly middle class market and seem inextricably linked with the fashions, poses and preoccupations of the Daguerreian target audience - the privileged of society. Engravings reveal a wealth of detail in their densely hatched lines particular to notions of self representation, offering us alternative (monochrome as in daguerreotypes) versions of painted portraits which bring to mind daguerreotypes of paintings and prints (created as copies forming a part of a greater art inventory?) popularised during the 1840's. One is permitted to note the compositional balance and heroic fervour of many such portraits which tend to portray subjects as dignified, educated, and bordering on the superhuman. Other likenesses have a patriotic feel to them, where the sitter is posed with their hand on the heart, pledging allegiance and loyalty to Queen and Country - or possibly just steadying themselves for the painter or daguerreotypist after a particularly large luncheon?
The decline of the Neo-Classical movement came at the end of the 1830's and was greatly exploited by Daguerreian operators in their portraits of people of note who adopted the a la mode pictorial vocabulary of artist's to infuse their daguerreotypes with even loftier appeal to those who could afford the process. The daguerreotypist would attempt to evoke the desired characteristics of the sitter by allusion to the sublime revival of classical symbolism and assimilate the ethos of the grand manner so redolent in the painted canvasses of the era into the intricate geometry of the daguerreotype.
Some comparisons between engravings and daguerreotypes from the mid 1840's serve to elucidate the differences (tension between realism and idealism) and the similarities (compositional plagiarism, emphasis on status and class, preoccupation with fashion as an emblem of power and kudos) that exist between the two media and make for compelling study.
This frontispiece (Fig 1) from The People's Gallery of Engravings (1844) is entitled, 'England's Hope' and portrays a little boy aged about 6-7 years old wearing an off the shoulder dress ( common practice to dress boys in frocks during this period and led to no known or apparent cases of transvestism in later life). The portrait is surrounded by an oval garland of roses, lilies and ribbons (similar to the decorative elements also embossed on the covers of daguerreotype cases). The bust engraving is taken from a painting by Sir W.C. Ross R.A. and encapsulates the early Victorian penchant for sentimentality, the grandiose depiction of beauty that epitomises the grandeur of the miniature. Such images are saturated in a curiously mid-Victorian saccharine expression.
Compared with the 9th plate English daguerreotype (Fig 2) taken around 1846-50 we can see how photographers were influenced and experimented with notions of aesthetics in portraiture. The daguerreotype portrays a little lad aged about 4-6 years wearing an off the shoulder dress (note the delineation of masculinity - the hair is parted on the side signalling that the subject is a male ; the boy also wears a very broad belt with a large buckle) looking off into the distance, as does the boy in the engraving. Both images are intimate and celebrate the child's emergence into boyhood. The daguerreotype has more of a sense of realism in that it does not feign the posturing arrogance so loaded in the engraving.
However, in another engraving ' Lord Fordwick ' (Fig 3) a young boy is posed looking in the opposite direction, he sports a mass of tousled locks and looks healthy, happy and wealthy. Obviously the child of an aristocrat, the engraving captures something of the spirit of the neoclassical movement - there is a hint of a landscape behind the boy's shoulder (abstract swirl of foliage and sky). The florid verse that accompanies this illustration exemplifies the intended message behind this type of image:
" Fair is thy youthful face, and well combines
The different beauty of lovely lines;
Earnest the light that fills thy Poet-eyes,
Thoughtfully turn'd toward the distant skies:
In a rose-path of life thy fate hath found thee,
Beauty, and rank, and wealth, and love surround thee…"
In this exceptional 6th plate English daguerreotype (Fig 4) of a Brother and Sister, circa 1842 -44 we can glimpse the artistry and excellence of these early Victorian attributes in a sophisticated and charming daguerreotype. The children are attractive and carefully posed against a landscape (painted backdrop?) that exudes an Arcadian theme. There is more feathery painted foliage, a balustrade and a large urn positioned on top of a Trompe l'oeil pedestal or wall. The boy is lost in contemplation with his head resting upon his hand, a young poete maudit dreaming fanciful reveries. The girl faces the camera with resolute dignity and self-assurance and appears slightly older than her seated sibling.
Compositionally this daguerreotype is a miniature masterpiece that borrows from the cultural zeitgeist of the period to achieve a superior and mesmerising image of compatibility and togetherness. Thus we are presented with an unbreakable bond between brother and sister, history and allegory, romantic sentimentalism and the dynamics of the daguerreotype.
An unusual tinted 9th plate genre daguerreotype (Fig 5) 9th plate, circa 1850 of a family group is of equal interest to our study. Mother and daughter are posed against a surreal background of heavy studio drapes and painted clouds (bringing the outside indoors?) - indicating that this is possibly from the studio of W.E. Kilburn (unmarked case). They attentively face the patriarch who points emphatically to the 'good book', a bible held in his hand. Daguerreotypes such as this are rare in England and attempt to tell a moral story: the God fearing family unit obeying the pious example set by the pater familias.
In Evening Prayer, (Fig 6) an engraving from the mid 1840's, a family are seated around a bespectacled father who reads from the Bible. The well-to-do middle classes are represented with perfect composure and focus is on the weighty volume that dominates the ensemble's attention. The complexity of group daguerreotypes meant that each person posed in the image had to become a living statue and hold a position or feign a posture that befitted their character as envisaged by them or interpreted by the photographer for the projected resultant image. This level of contrivance lends these images a curious air of pretence and seems to be derived from the social, ethical and moralistic compositions explored in painting during the 1840's. Such daguerreotypes are extremely rare in Britain and would have been commissioned at the specific request of the sitters. In this example they are amateur players in a silent and motionless act of obeisance and hierarchical duty. Such miniature enigmas are the food of Daguerreian dreams.
Copyright C. Shaun Caton 2004. All rights reserved.
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About the author |
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Shaun is an internationally known writer, curator and collector of daguerreotypes who has written extensively in journals and magazines throughout the World on daguerreotypes.
His highly original style of writing makes for engaging and informative reading.
All rights for this article and the beautiful images remain with Shaun.
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