William Edward Hartpole Lecky
c. 1893
Medium
Photogravure, plate 25 from the album "Lord Tennyson and his Friends" (1893)
Dimensions
Image: 23.8 × 17.6 cm (9 3/8 × 6 15/16 in.); Album page: 45.2 × 37.2 cm (17 13/16 × 14 11/16 in.)
Classification
photogravure
Department
Photography and Media
Museum
Art Institute of Chicago
Accession Number
136883
Art Historical Context
This striking photogravure portrait captures William Edward Hartpole Lecky, a prominent Irish historian and thinker, as rendered by photographer Henry Herschel Hay Cameron around 1893. It forms plate 25 in the celebrated album *Lord Tennyson and his Friends*, a luxurious publication that immortalized the Victorian poet laureate Alfred, Lord Tennyson, alongside his intellectual companions. Produced in the final years of the 19th century, the album reflects the era's fascination with photography as a means to document literary and cultural elites, blending artistry with documentary precision. P...