Most of the time we never know who they were. And even when we know their names, it often means so very little. Why?
Photography is a medium for the masses. Unlike the professional portraiture in paint that existed for hundreds of years before the silver canvas emerged, the photograph was available to everyone and no one.
Starting with the daguerreotype, photography became became the most anonymous form of portraiture. For the sitter and his circle alone. Usually that circle meant family and friends.
In contrast, the painted portrait is more often identified, and identified as someone of note, or at least someone that shows up in our our look back through historical records.
The works were often signed by the painters, of which there were few, and kept in families forever, all the while retaining the identity of the sitter. Daguerreotypes and other early photographs, perhaps because there were so many, or because they were rarely treasured as art on their own, but rather a mechanical recording of a face, slip so much more frequently into anonymity.
That was its great draw. Photography was readily available in many towns by the mid 1840s, just a few years after its commercialization in 1839. By 1850 the medium had exploded. In 1853, the New York Daily Tribune estimated that three million daguerreotypes were being made annually.
In their excellent (and highly scientific) book, The daguerreotype: nineteenth-century technology and modern science, M. Susan Barger and William Blaine White posit that as many as 30 million daguerreotypes were made in the U.S. during the 20-year period that they were around.
I can assure you, the number of painted portraits made during the 20 years prior to the introduction of the daguerreotype comes nowhere near this figure.
The many early images still around wind up in the hands of collectors today, who mainly treasure them for their aesthetics, artfulness and historical information when much is apparent. They are also treasured for the identity of the sitter, when present. But again, that information is so often lost to time.
That is in part because early images are so durable, and have physically outlasted the the weak bindings of the conscious history that runs between generations. We tend only to think of the relatives that we knew while they lived. Few rave about the great grandpa they never met, who had a funny name and farmed corn on some obscure stretch of farmland far from our time.
Painted portraits, on the other hand, seem to stay attached to the identity of the sitter.
I for one enjoy portraits for their sheer appearance. The look of the sitter, the composition and artfulness of the shot. The lighting. The gaze. The indescribable traits we see in faces that intrigue us, make us uncomfortable or at ease. But photographic portraiture allows us to stare without embarrassing anyone. We can look for as long as we want, enjoying the package of wonder, and the tales our minds make up to explain it all.
And yes, sometimes there is a name attached. And once in a great while, it is of someone we can find in the census, or in a few newspaper articles, so that we may know a tiny bit about them. Rarer yet is the image that is of someone we recognize immediately, but never really knew. I dream of finding an unknown image of Daniel Webster.
Almost never do we find an image that is both very old and yet of someone whom we know entirely. Someone who took us fishing, someone with a wry and-easy going sense of humor, someone tough and yet soft with age, someone who yelled and swore and chased me with a broomstick. Someone whose hands were a giant's. Who could shake a just-solidified lead fishing sinker out of a mold and into his palm without feeling any pain thanks to thick callouses from a lifetime of labor. Someone who is very old now, but who is every bit that younger person, just under a layer of age 100-feet thick.
To behold the beginning of a life in a format so old, so foreign, and the last half in person is a remarkable feeling. The photo becomes something different. It isn't an artifact, or something artistic. It is an ancient family photo of a person who has crossed into a very different time, and one that is far removed from that early photography format.
It lends meaning to what those early photos truly meant to their first keepers. They were about the sitter, and about time, aging and memories - and something that can hardly be explained but that we all feel when we look at an old photo of a loved one. It is important to remember this feeling as we try to appreciate early anonymous images.
My grandfather, Stanley Beczkowski, born 1921, with his mother, 16, and father, 22. Niagara Falls, N.Y. Circa 1922.
Thanksgiving Day, Nov. 25, 2010. Age: 89
Photography is a medium for the masses. Unlike the professional portraiture in paint that existed for hundreds of years before the silver canvas emerged, the photograph was available to everyone and no one.
Starting with the daguerreotype, photography became became the most anonymous form of portraiture. For the sitter and his circle alone. Usually that circle meant family and friends.
In contrast, the painted portrait is more often identified, and identified as someone of note, or at least someone that shows up in our our look back through historical records.
The works were often signed by the painters, of which there were few, and kept in families forever, all the while retaining the identity of the sitter. Daguerreotypes and other early photographs, perhaps because there were so many, or because they were rarely treasured as art on their own, but rather a mechanical recording of a face, slip so much more frequently into anonymity.
That was its great draw. Photography was readily available in many towns by the mid 1840s, just a few years after its commercialization in 1839. By 1850 the medium had exploded. In 1853, the New York Daily Tribune estimated that three million daguerreotypes were being made annually.
In their excellent (and highly scientific) book, The daguerreotype: nineteenth-century technology and modern science, M. Susan Barger and William Blaine White posit that as many as 30 million daguerreotypes were made in the U.S. during the 20-year period that they were around.
I can assure you, the number of painted portraits made during the 20 years prior to the introduction of the daguerreotype comes nowhere near this figure.
The many early images still around wind up in the hands of collectors today, who mainly treasure them for their aesthetics, artfulness and historical information when much is apparent. They are also treasured for the identity of the sitter, when present. But again, that information is so often lost to time.
That is in part because early images are so durable, and have physically outlasted the the weak bindings of the conscious history that runs between generations. We tend only to think of the relatives that we knew while they lived. Few rave about the great grandpa they never met, who had a funny name and farmed corn on some obscure stretch of farmland far from our time.
Painted portraits, on the other hand, seem to stay attached to the identity of the sitter.
I for one enjoy portraits for their sheer appearance. The look of the sitter, the composition and artfulness of the shot. The lighting. The gaze. The indescribable traits we see in faces that intrigue us, make us uncomfortable or at ease. But photographic portraiture allows us to stare without embarrassing anyone. We can look for as long as we want, enjoying the package of wonder, and the tales our minds make up to explain it all.
And yes, sometimes there is a name attached. And once in a great while, it is of someone we can find in the census, or in a few newspaper articles, so that we may know a tiny bit about them. Rarer yet is the image that is of someone we recognize immediately, but never really knew. I dream of finding an unknown image of Daniel Webster.
Almost never do we find an image that is both very old and yet of someone whom we know entirely. Someone who took us fishing, someone with a wry and-easy going sense of humor, someone tough and yet soft with age, someone who yelled and swore and chased me with a broomstick. Someone whose hands were a giant's. Who could shake a just-solidified lead fishing sinker out of a mold and into his palm without feeling any pain thanks to thick callouses from a lifetime of labor. Someone who is very old now, but who is every bit that younger person, just under a layer of age 100-feet thick.
To behold the beginning of a life in a format so old, so foreign, and the last half in person is a remarkable feeling. The photo becomes something different. It isn't an artifact, or something artistic. It is an ancient family photo of a person who has crossed into a very different time, and one that is far removed from that early photography format.
It lends meaning to what those early photos truly meant to their first keepers. They were about the sitter, and about time, aging and memories - and something that can hardly be explained but that we all feel when we look at an old photo of a loved one. It is important to remember this feeling as we try to appreciate early anonymous images.
My grandfather, Stanley Beczkowski, born 1921, with his mother, 16, and father, 22. Niagara Falls, N.Y. Circa 1922.
Thanksgiving Day, Nov. 25, 2010. Age: 89
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