Julia Margaret Cameron

Sadness 1864

© Julia Margaret Cameron

Cameron is recognized as a pioneer of photography and one of the great portrait photographers of all time. She photographed many of the major figures of the nineteenth century, including Robert Browning, Thomas Carlyle, Charles Darwin, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, and Alfred Tennyson.The bulk of her work, however, consists of portraits of women.

Using dramatic lighting and soft focus, Cameron made mesmerizing psychological portraits that exhibit an intensity of emotion not often publicly revealed in Victorian society. Her portraits of women are variously defiant, fortright, melancholy, or languidly sensual, offering, when seen together, an unexpectedly complex view of the photographer and her time.

The Echo

1868

© Julia Margaret Cameron

Julia Jackson 1867

© Julia Margaret Cameron