Sir Colin Campbell Lord Clyde (1792-1863), Field Marshal; At the Crimea 1855

This photograph of Sir Colin Campbell was created by Roger Fenton, likely around 1855, using the wet collodion process. It was a relatively new technique at the time, involving coating a glass plate with chemicals, exposing it in the camera while still wet, and then developing it immediately. The final print on paper reveals the subtle tonal range achievable with this method, from the deep blacks of Campbell’s uniform to the soft grays of his face and hair. The collodion process, while revolutionary, was labor-intensive and required a portable darkroom tent, especially challenging in a battlefield setting. Fenton, commissioned to document the Crimean War, aimed to legitimize photography as a fine art while also sanitizing the brutal realities of war. This image, with its staged formality, reflects that tension: the material reality of photographic production versus the social and political agenda it served. It reminds us that all art, even photography, is a constructed reality shaped by materials, processes, and context.