Historical Media Photographer

Disderi, Andre-Adolphe-Eugene. Carte-de-visite. George Eastman House Collection, 1860.

Andre-Adolphe Eugene Disderi

Disderi was born in Paris, France in 1819. Although he sought a career in the arts, he turned to business in order to support his family after hi father's death. In 1848 he moved to the city of Brest in western France and opened a small photography studio. He started by making daguerreotypes, but then experimented with the wet collodion process, and started making photos of athletes, beggars, and laborers.

Disderi is most well known for patenting his small carte-de-visite photos. These photo could be made easily and cheaply, since four frames could be captured on a single sheet, and then could be cut out and given to people. Since royalty also liked these photos, multiple images of famous persons could be made and sold en masse. Disderi's photos were basically the forerunner to the baseball card and the wallet-sized photo.

This photo, or photos, I should say, is nicely balanced with urns or steps anchoring the centered figure in the composition. Emphasis is obviously placed on the subject, since it is a portrait, and therefore the lighting is more highly contrasted on the subject than in the background, which fades to black around the edges.

This image was produced for commercial use, but it is interesting to note that the pose in each is slightly different. It shows many angles of the same person, and perhaps this was useful in deciding which pose to give to which person. A more formal pose for an associate, but a freer pose for an intimate. As a pictorial calling card, the composition emphasizes the subject, and strives to portray them in a good light, so to speak.

Disderi used a single camera with four lenses divided by a septum, which allowed him to put multiple images on a single plate. These could then be cut out and mounted on cardboard. I suppose that the intention was to innovate the traditional calling-card, and make it available, in a new form, for the lower classes as well.

What I really like about this work is the concept behind it. Even though these are mass-produced images, or the forerunners of them, there is something intimate about giving someone a picture instead of a business or calling card. I know I'm old fashioned, but I love the idea of giving someone a kind of social business card with an image instead of just words.

http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/165519/Andre-Adolphe-Eugene-Disderi