Young dragon trees and date palm in a cactus garden near Orotava before 1886

This photobook page by Charles Piazzi Smyth captures young dragon trees and a date palm in a cactus garden near Orotava. As a photographic image, it is the result of complex chemical processes of capturing light, fixing an image on a surface, and reproducing it as a print. The albumen print visible here, a popular method in the 19th century, involves coating paper with egg white to create a glossy surface, sensitized with silver nitrate, and exposed to light through a negative. The process requires meticulous work, precise timing, and a deep understanding of material reactions. The very nature of the photographic medium, which mechanically reproduces images, transformed artistic practices, challenging traditional notions of artistic skill, labor, and authenticity. By democratizing image-making, photography served emerging industries of mass media and advertising, as well as scientific research, making the print both an aesthetic and a technological object.