The secret world of daguerreotypes: photography meets surrealism!

The secret world of daguerreotypes: photography meets surrealism!

Research into photography and its effects on art remains a fascinating topic. A look at the beginnings of photography shows a time when surrealism has not yet been defined and the technology of photography has just started to find its place in art history. As FAZ.NET , photography had a mysterious, dreamy and disturbing dimension from the start. This was reflected in the work of the earliest photographers, who chose motifs that were the harbinger of future epoch -up styles.

The most remarkable early photographer was Hippolyte Bayard, who staged himself as a water corpse, while Lewis Carroll let the girl Xie kitchen climb out the window. These early works show creativity and the experimental spirit that shaped photography. For Mayer and Pierson, the Comtesse de Castiglione came through an empty frame of a Daguerreotype, which further illustrates the connection between photography and art.

the daguerreotype and its influence

The Daguerreotype, an early form of photography, was presented in Paris in 1839 and triggered a media revolution that extends to the present, reports suedkurier.de . This technique was very popular in the first few years, but this also led to its caricature worthy. In 1847, Honoré Daumier criticized the long exposure times in the lithography, while Théodore Maurisset mocked the success of the Daguerreotype in a satirical work.

The Musée d’Orsay has had an extensive collection of photographs since 1979 that included Daguerreotypes and received its core with the Kodak donation from 1983, as musee-orsay.fr . This collection emphasizes the quality of Daguerre's successors and shows the endeavor of these photographers to redesign the reality through the camera. Photographers such as Adolphe Humbert de Molard and Louis-Auguste Bisson created impressive works that illustrate the influence of painting on photographer techniques.

The interactions between photography and painting

The connection between photography and painting is complex. Already in the early phase of photography, these appearances of painting took over and reproduced famous works of art. These developments led painters like Hans Thoma and Max Liebermann to the artistic claim to photography. Nevertheless, many artists, including impressionists, found a valuable tool in photography to support their works.

Changes in the art world were favored by the catalyst of the Daguerreotype, which also inspired other inventors such as Fox Talbot. The WET Collodion process, which Archer introduced in the early 1850s, represented a significant further development and added the possibilities of reproducible negatives with fine details.

The exciting discussion about the role of photography in art development is continued to this day. Photographers such as Ray and Meret Oppenheim contributed to establishing photography as an independent art form, and thus asked the question of the value of painting in a world in which photography increasingly gained importance.