PHOTOGR A P H Y A S A

BUSIN E S S T O O L
MONA L IZ A PAC IA AFA B L E

MEDIA ARTS 101

PHOTOGRAPHS FOR SALE: PORTRAIT

As photographs became easier, faster, and less expensive to make, the demand
grew for photographs and for photographic equipment. Portrait studios sprung up
in different parts of the world in the 19th century.
Augustus Washington, John
Brown, c. 1846 or 1847,
daguerreotype, 7.7” x 4.4”
(National Portrait Gallery,
Washington, D.C.).
In France, in the mid-1800s and on into the Belle Époque (1871-1914), photographs in
many different forms were popular. The photographic portrait was extremely popular,
especially considering the time-consuming and expensive tradition of painted portraits.

(Gaspard-Félix Tournachon) Nadar (1820-1910) was notable in Paris for his creative
uses of the photograph.
Honoré Daumier, May 25,
1862, lithograph, image
without text: 10 1/2″ x 8
11/16″, plate: 17 1/2″ x 12
5/16″, The Metropolitan
Museum of Art, New York.
Nadar and his son Paul Nadar (1856-1939) built a successful business in a portrait
studio and beyond.

They photographed notable figures of the time including Selika Lazevski, a black
horsewoman who rode and performed in the Nouveau Cirque in Paris.
Studio of Paul Nadar,
Selika Laveski,
1891, photograph.
In Paris and in other parts of the world, small portrait photographs were produced in
multiple, glued onto individual cardboard backings making cartes de visite, “visiting
cards” or calling cards. Cartes de visite were traded and collected in albums, and
photographic calling cards of celebrities and important figures in society were highly
desired.
MARKETING CAMERAS AND PHOTOGRAPHIC
EQUIPMENT
In 1888, the George Eastman Kodak Company was founded to produce and sell
analog cameras and equipment.

A look at their marketing campaign over the decades is a telling reflection of social
history and the popularity of photography.
Alf Cooke Ltd., Leed and London,
Eastman Kodak Company,
Advertisement for Folding Pocket
Kodak Camera featuring the Kodak
Girl, c. 1913, lithograph, 29 1/2″ x
19″, George Eastman Museum.
The Kodak Girl became a symbol for the company associating photography with
freedom and ease.

These were also simultaneously themes of the suffrage movements and the
phenomenon of the New woman. New woman was the name given to the
Modern woman of the early 20th century who challenged roles of women by
breaking stereotypical gender barriers and working for women’s rights.
Magazine Advertisement for Kodak
Pocket Instamatic Camera, in Ebony
Magazine (Johnson Publishing), vol.
28, no. 2, December 1972, p. 141.
Eastman Kodak Company,
Magazine Advertisement for Kodak
Film, July 1977, advertisement printed
on a magazine page, 13″ x 9″, George
Eastman Museum.
By the 1960s, responding to the Civil Rights movement and the power of the Black
consumer, Kodak began advertising to a Black audience in the U.S. through magazines
like Ebony and Jet.

It wasn’t until the 1990s that the technology behind color recognition of skin pigments
was prioritized culturally.