Likeness: Portrait Photographs from the Collection

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Likeness: Portrait Photographs from the Collection
Thomas Southall, curator
Spencer Museum of Art, University of Kansas, Lawrence, Kansas

The first great impact of photography was not in science or in creating a totally new art form, but in democratizing the tradition of portraiture. for centuries the portrait was luxury primarily limited to the wealthy elite. Suddenly, little more than a decade after photography's introduction in 1839, anyone who could afford a quarter dollar could have an intensely real daguerreotype portrait of himself or a loved one.

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