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Article 8 are reversed compared to that seen in the museum’s photographic copy of the entire portrait: No. 10326759. �e pose in Fig. 4 was reversed in a woodcut that accompanied Daguerre’s obituary in the Illustrated London News, which may be seen on the Daguerreian Society’s Web site. �e News wrongly credited the original daguerreotype to Antoine Claudet, and dated it to 1846. �e caption for Fig. 4 contains the reference to the de�nitive correction of these errors in the News itself. Finally, Can�eld illustrated his 1893 article with the famous and excellent John Adams Whipple crystallotype copy of another Meade Daguerre portrait. It had been published in the February 1855 Photographic and Fine Art Journal. I am pleased to be able to present a copy of the actual daguerreotype from which the crystallotype was copied: Fig. 5. It was provided by the Société Française de Photographie, Paris, which has owned it since 1905, and I greatly appreciate the assistance of the curator, Carole Trou�eau. In his �rst article, Can�eld also referred to an N. Orr engraving of Daguerre, Fig. 9, that had appeared on the cover of the �rst issue of the Daguerreian Journal. 3 Although he decided that it was copied from Fig. 2, the accompanying description indicates that it may re�ect the existence of another, otherwise unknown, Meade Daguerre daguerreotype. 4 In 2001, I presented a slide lecture at the Daguerreian Society Symposium in Kansas City titled “Commemorating the 150 th Anniversary of Daguerre’s Death, 1851–2001: Charles R. Meade’s Daguerre Pictures Revisited and a Look at the Meade Brothers’ Firm and Family.” By that time, I was able to discuss and show copies of the �rst �ve, Can�eldnumbered Meade portraits of the inventor as well as several more. However, I did not show the Orr engraving as one of them. I have since learned that the late, renowned photo historian Beaumont Newhall authored an article in 1979 titled “Seven Portraits of Daguerre.” All seven of these, including one believed to be represented by the Orr engraving, he credited to Charles R. Meade. 5 Two of the images I presented in my lecture were not covered in his article. One of these is Fig. 8, the Meade daguerreotype of Daguerre that was acquired by the J. Paul Getty Museum in 1984. It should be noted that in this one, Daguerre’s head is not steadied by his arm and hand. Possibly, the existence of this daguerreotype was unknown to Newhall at the time of his article. �e other, Fig. 6, is one that is very similar to Figs. 3, 4, and 5 . . . especially Fig. 5. It is so close, in fact, that when I supplied an illustration of Fig. 6 to a scholarly institution to ask if it owned an original or a copy of this picture, its photography curator said yes, mistaking it for Fig. 5. Consequently, I ordered a copy for a fee. Unfortunately, because no JPEG preview of it was available to warn of the error, when I received my purchase, it was a copy of Fig. 5 instead of Fig. 6! It was a major disappointment. Comparative examination reveals that in Fig. 5, Daguerre is more face-forward. Also, his right arm obscures the top of Fig. 4. Meade, Charles R. Meade Brothers Studio. Louis-Jacques-Mandé Daguerre, 1787–1851. Copy of carte-de-visite, picture No. 4 in C. W. Can�eld’s “More Portraits of Daguerre,” American Annual of Photography, 1893, 80, 14.7 x 11.7 cm. Miriam and Ira D. Wallach Division of Art, Prints and Photographs, �e New York Public Library, Astor, Lenox and Tilden Foundations. Carte-de-visite owned by Charles Ehrmann. Woodcut in Illustrated London News, July 26, 1851, p. 117, said to be from daguerreotype by Antoine Claudet; see correction published: Nov. 22, 1851, p. 614. Fig. 5. Meade, Charles R. Meade Brothers Studio. Louis-Jacques-Mandé Daguerre, 1787–1851. Half-plate daguerreotype, 1848 ©Société Française de Photographie coll. All Rights Reserved. Fig. 6. Meade, Charles R. Meade Brothers Studio. Louis-Jacques- Mandé Daguerre, 1787–1851. “To Force the Sun to Paint Pictures,” New York Times Magazine, August 30, 1964, 22. If you know where an original daguerreotype or photographic copy of this portrait is located or have any information, kindly inform the author at: rebott@ yahoo.com. Your assistance will be gratefully acknowledged. The Daguerreian Society Newsletter January - March 2010!"
the chair, while in Fig. 6 the bottom of his arm is behind it. In the former portrait, more of Daguerre’s right hand is visible and his �ngers surround a clump of his hair; in Fig. 6, his �ngers are almost completely hidden from view. �ere is also a more elongated space between Daguerre’s bent upper and lower right arm and hand in Fig. 5. �e triangle of chair upholstery seen in the two images is larger in Fig. 5. Some might feel that Daguerre is not only steadying his head in Fig. 5 but is also pushing it forward a bit awkwardly. He appears better positioned and more relaxed in Fig. 6. I �rst made the exciting discovery of another Meade Daguerre portrait, Fig. 6, while examining a �le of photocopies relating to Daguerre at the Richard and Ronay Menschel Library at the George Eastman House in 2000. I was attending a week-long Historic Processes Workshop at the time and eminent authority Grant Romer told me of the �le’s existence. Looking through it, I immediately recognized one portrait in it to be a copy of a Meade original that I had never seen before. Outside its characteristic oval, the photocopy has a signature (with the �rst three names abbreviated) identifying Gaspard-Félix Tournachon Nadar as the copier of another, original Meade daguerreotype. I showed a slide of it in my 2001 lecture. It turned out that Fig. 6 had also appeared in �e New York Times Magazine in August 1964 in “To Force the Sun to Paint Pictures.” �e article’s illustrations were supposed to be by Daguerre, but obviously this one wasn’t. The source was said to be a �érèse Bonney Archive, George Eastman House. 6 Inquiries made to the Eastman House, directed to archivist Joseph R. Struble, elicited the information that Eastman House does not have this picture nor is its current location known. Some other institutions were contacted because they have M. �érèse Bonney holdings, but they did not have it either. To advance scholarship, the author would very much like to locate the original or a photographic copy of this Meade portrait and will gratefully acknowledge any information or assistance received. In 1964, when Fig. 6 was published and said to Article Fig. 7. Meade, Charles R. Meade Brothers Studio. Louis- Jacques-Mandé Daguerre, 1787–1851. Print Collection Portrait File./D/Louis-Jacques-Mandé Daguerre n.d. Print. Digital ID: 1219821 (Artist: Francis D’Avignon, Lithograph of 1848 Meade daguerreotype, circa 1849) Print Collection, Miriam and Ira D. Wallach Division of Art, Prints and Photographs, �e New York Public Library, Astor, Lenox and Tilden Foundations. be at the George Eastman House, Beaumont Newhall was there and would certainly have known of its existence. It is, therefore, hard to understand why he would not have included it in his 1979 article, and thereby have had to change its title from “Seven Portraits of Daguerre” to “Eight. . . .” It is, without question, another of what I have described as Charles R. Meade’s “white-tie” series of Daguerre portraits. 7 Another such portrait is known only from a famous lithograph executed by Francis D’Avignon of New York. In Paris, French artist Paul Carpentier copied and reversed its image of Daguerre in a famous painting and also used it as the basis for a bust of the inventor. A copy of this lithograph is at the National Portrait Gallery, S/NPG.77.130. Its image of Daguerre is seen here in Fig. 7 within a decorative oval in a lesser-known version at the New York Public Library. It may be seen on the NYPL’s Digital Gallery Web site. �e pose in Fig. 7 is somewhat similar to those in Figs. 1 and 2. A New York Tribune article highlighted the role of the inventor’s niece by marriage, Georgina Arrowsmith, in persuading Daguerre to pose for Charles when he visited. “�e girl told him not to be discouraged, that she would try the arts of persuasion on her good-natured old uncle, and that she hoped Fig. 8. Meade, Charles R. Meade Brothers Studio. Louis-Jacques-Mandé Daguerre, 1787–1851. Half-plate, hand-colored daguerreotype 1848, Image: 6 5/16” X 4 13/16 “ (16.0 x 12.0 cm) �e J. Paul Getty Museum 84.XT.953. The Daguerreian Society Newsletter "!January - March 2010 9
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