Civil War Collage
c. 1860/70
Medium
Photocollage (albumen prints)
Dimensions
Image/ paper: 33.4 × 30.7 cm (13 3/16 × 12 1/8 in.)
Classification
photograph
Department
Photography and Media
Museum
Art Institute of Chicago
Accession Number
204013
Rights
Public Domain
About this artwork
Around the time of the Civil War, cartes de visite—small, inexpensive studio portraits—became extremely popular among middle-class Americans. Cartes were traded, kept in albums, and occasionally cut and pasted to form personalized collages. This is an unusual example of a portrait collage in that it implies a family tree, with layers of photographs clustered at the bottom and hierarchical rows at the top. It is possible that the composition focuses on a Union soldier, his commanding officers, an...
About the Artist
Unknown
The artist designated as "Unknown" in our virtual museum's collection exemplifies a poignant chapter in art history: creators whose identities have faded into obscurity despite the enduring power of their work. With only one known artwork attributed to them in our holdings, this figure represents countless anonymous hands that shaped visual culture across centuries. Museums worldwide, including th...