#1 November 2nd, 2010 11:04 PM

blissed

Member

Portrait photo 1839

I just stumbled on the 1st portrait photo ever taken. I don't know how many people are interested but I find it fascinating. It's a self prtrait by Robert Cornelius taken in 1839. I like the not sure if this is really gonna work look in his eyes :) I love his high collar jacket too. those short fronted long tail jackets with breeches should come back in fashion. They'd look great tailored for ladies too. Love to at least wear all that to a Pride and prejudice and zombies party.

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ngaio

Member

Re: Portrait photo 1839

Oh wow, that's awesome! Thanks for sharing, Blissed.

Gotta say... he looks gorgeous in this photo! I agree that those clothes should come back into fashion...

shara_c

Member

Re: Portrait photo 1839

Thanks for posting this, it's super cool and I hadn't seen it before. He's a certainly a dashing fellow!

Folly

Member

Re: Portrait photo 1839

Wow great find! I love old portraits.  I'm collecting some at home, to make my hallway scary to walk down.  All their eyes follow you!

veronicaf

Member

Re: Portrait photo 1839

It's funny because if you cut out the old fashioned clothing from the pic he could probably pass as modern. The hair and the face....

blissed

Member

Re: Portrait photo 1839

Ooh I like the hallway of creepy eyes idea! :) Apart from the smaller lapels and collar Regency mens  clothes have survived almost unchanged in equestrian competitions, http://jhequestrian.co.uk/MensRidingJackets.aspx even the competition shirts and breeches are Regency. http://jhequestrian.co.uk/MensShirts.aspx At £39 that shirt looks tempting :)

I think Roberts portrait looks contemporary because it's unusually informal and candid and today we're use to capturing that. When I think about him standing there motionless for 5 mins he'd never seen a photo of anyone, he was the 1at. so he didn't even brush his hair :) he seems as unselfconscious as someone who's unaware their picture is being taken.  I get the same feeling from Julia Margaret Cameron's 1864 pic of Annie Philpot (her 1st successful picture) which also looks contemporary I think because Annie was similarly as unaware as Robert. She'd never seen any of Margrets photo's because she was the 1st and as a child in 1864 had likely never seen a photo of anyone else either. I think with these pics taken before all the awareness of what having your picture taken really means we seem to get a very very rare but tiny glimpse of how they actually were.

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Last edited by blissed (November 6th, 2010 01:20 PM)

ngaio

Member

Re: Portrait photo 1839

Oh that is just beautiful.

Head

Administrator

Re: Portrait photo 1839

I don't want to be all like mr cynical, but I'm guessing that's not so much the first portrait ever taken, as the first portrait good enough to show the world.

blissed

Member

Re: Portrait photo 1839

Yeah it's the 1st successful portrait. It had to be something lots of people were keen to try so I'm sure there were a few previous attempts that hit the bin.

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blissed

Member

Re: Portrait photo 1839

Looks like  Robert Cornelius has made it onto the bangable dudes in history list :) http://bangabledudesinhistory.blogspot.com/

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