Fotoreproductie van een schilderij van een engel door Paul Delaroche before 1858

This is Robert Jefferson Bingham’s photographic reproduction of Paul Delaroche’s painting of an angel. Bingham, who was active in Paris, lived in a time when photography was still finding its place among more established forms of art. This reproduction, which appears in a bound album, signals the shifting hierarchies of the art world at the time. Beyond merely documenting Delaroche’s original, the photograph also offers a new reading of the painting. Consider the shift from paint to photograph. It brings an increased emphasis on realism, but also renders the angel in grayscale. Where Delaroche's painting may have bathed the angel in divine light, Bingham’s photograph encourages us to reflect on the image's composition and the angel’s identity, and on how this representation may challenge or affirm traditional notions of beauty, spirituality, and femininity.