Julia Margaret Cameron: Pioneer of Modern Glamour Photography?

“It may amuse you, Mother, to try to photograph during your solitude,” Julia Margaret Cameron’s daughter told her while presenting her with her birthday gift in 1863 while Mr. Cameron and sons were away. Forty-eight-year-old Julia took the clunky box camera in her hands and soon took to her new hobby with more energy than expertise (at least at first). Using her connections to famous friends, Julia Margaret Cameron became the all-seeing eye of Victorian celebrity, recording notable faces for posterity. But, as can be seen in the exhibition Julia Margaret Cameron, which runs at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, through January 5, 2014, Cameron’s camera created images strikingly similar to modern glamour photography—equal parts documentation and deception. Is Julia Margaret Cameron a pioneer of modern glamour photography? Please come over to Picture This at Big Think to read more of "Julia Margaret Cameron: Pioneer of Modern Glamour Photography?"

[Image: Julia Margaret Cameron (English, 1815–1879). Christabel, 1866. Albumen silver print from glass negative. Harris Brisbane Dick Fund, 1941. The Metropolitan Museum of Art (41.21.26).]

[Many thanks to the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, for providing me with the image above and other press materials related to Julia Margaret Cameron, which runs through January 5, 2014.]

How Photography Changed Painting (and Vice Versa)

When painter and showman Louis-Jacques-Mandé Daguerre burst onto the scene in 1839 with his Daguerreotype—one of the earliest forms of photography—“Daguerreotypemania” quickly ensued. The art world quickly took notice of the new kid on the block, both negatively and positively. Dominique de Font-Réaulx’s simply titled Painting and Photography: 1839-1914 tells the not so simple story of how photography came to influence the world of painting, and vice versa. “[C]oncentrating less on immediate links between a photo and a given work of painting or drawing,” de Font-Réaulx instead focuses “on the manner in which photography gave rise to a paradigm of representation at once original yet familiar.” Painting and Photography: 1839-1914 outlines how what started as competition soon became an alliance of vision that changed the way we see forever. Please come over to Picture This at Big Think to read more of "How Photography Changed Painting (and Vice Versa)."

[Image: (Left) Théodore Chassériau, The Two Sisters, c. 1845, oil on canvas, Musée du Louvre, Paris. (Right) Anonymous, Portrait of Twin Sisters, c. 1848, colored daguerreotype, Musée d’Orsay, Paris. © Painting and Photography: 1839–1914 by Dominique de Font-Réaulx, Flammarion, 2013.]

[Many thanks to Rizzoli USA for providing me with the images above and a review copy of Dominique de Font-Réaulx’s Painting and Photography: 1839-1914.]