James Nasmyth (1808-1890)
Medium
salted paper print from calotype negative
Dimensions
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Classification
Photograph
Department
Photography
Museum
Cleveland Museum of Art
Credit
Andrew R. and Martha Holden Jennings Fund
Accession Number
1987.19
Tags
About this artwork
Among the earliest photographers to explore both the artistic and societal possibilities of the portrait were the painter David Octavius Hill and engineer Robert Adamson, partners for just three years before Adamson’s death. Elizabeth Rigby,seen here at age 35, went on to marry Sir Charles Eastlake and, in 1857, to write one of the first histories of photography as a fine art. James Nasmyth, an engineer who developed the steam hammer, holds a compass. Hill and Adamson often shot outdoors because...