Portret van Gerald William Balfour (1853-1945), Engels staatsman c. 1890 - 1910

This is a portrait of Gerald William Balfour, an English statesman, by the photographic firm Lafayette. It’s a relatively small print, made by exposing light-sensitive paper to a negative, then carefully developed. Photography, like other reproductive technologies, has long been associated with a democratizing impulse; in theory, anyone could have their portrait taken, not just the elite. But we should also remember that photography required specialized knowledge, equipment, and materials. Studios like Lafayette represented a concentration of these resources. This portrait is not just an image of a man, but also an artifact of a specific system of commercial production. The smooth, almost ethereal quality of the image speaks to the photographer’s expertise and, indeed, to Balfour’s elevated social position. This wasn't a snapshot, but a carefully composed likeness, designed to convey authority and status. So, while photography may have made portraiture more accessible, it also became another way to mark social distinctions, with the photographer playing a crucial, if sometimes invisible, role in that process.