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Julia Margaret Cameron
sir john herschel, april 1867
Albumen Print, mounted on card with gilt border, with Messrs Colnaghi blindstamp on the mount, rectangular cut-out below image, consistent with excision of autograph,
355 by 272mm
This powerful image is one of a small series of portrait studies of Sir John Herschel made by Mrs Cameron at his home, Collingwood, in April 1867.
The portrait session provided the photographer with an opportunity to pay lasting homage to the scientist, bequeathing to future generations a set of portraits of unique power and distinction. The present image, full-face, direct, is arguably the most compelling of this brief series, the gaze of the elderly man of science locked for ever in that of the inspired photographer.
Julia Margaret Cameron's relationship with Herschel dated back to their encounter in South Africa in 1836. The families became quite close, sharing wide interests in the arts. In 1864, when she was making her mark in photography, Cameron wrote to Herschel acknowledging his influence. 'Your eye can best detect and your imagination conceive all that is to be done and is still left undone, for you were my first Teacher & to you I owe all the first experiences & insights which were given to me when you sent me in India a score of years ago...the first specimens of Talbotypes...'
This portrait was available for sale in June 1867 at Colnaghi's Pall Mall East gallery at a price of £16, or £20 'with genuine autograph'. The apparent excision of the autograph from the present print's mount is probably the work of someone intending to capitalise on its potential value in the autograph market. This is a curious reflection on the changing patterns of appreciation of the value of fine photographs in the intervening years since the issue of this print by Colnaghi in the late 1860s.
Provenance:
A.C. Norman, Bromley Common, Kent, 1920s.
On loan to Royal Photographic Society from 1929, released May 17th 1978.
Thackrey & Robertson, San Francisco, 1978.
Literature:
For a full account of Herschel's life and involvements in photography see: Larry Schaaf, Sir John Herschel and the Invention of Photography, The Royal Photographic Society, 1981; Larry Schaaf, Out of the Shadows Herschel, Talbot & the Invention of Photography, New Haven and London, 1992.
For an account of Cameron's relationship with Herschel see: Colin Ford, The Cameron Collection An Album of Photographs by Julia Margaret Cameron Presented to Sir John Herschel, Wokingham, Berkshire and London, 1975.