Portret van Chester Arthur, 21e president der Verenigde Staten 1881 - 1886

This is a photograph of Chester Arthur, 21st President of the United States, made by Napoleon Sarony sometime in the late 19th century. Sarony was a master of the collodion process, a technique that involved coating a glass plate with a light-sensitive chemical emulsion. This was then exposed in the camera, and developed to produce a negative image. From this, multiple prints could be made on paper, like the one you see here. Photography in this period, while on the rise, was a painstaking process. The photographer had to be as much a chemist as an artist. The material result of this process – the photograph itself – became increasingly widespread, allowing the mass circulation of images, which could be consumed in new ways. Consider how this portrait democratized representation. It made images of the powerful more accessible, marking a shift in both art and social dynamics. It blurs the boundaries of both artistic and industrial practice.