William Henry Powell c. 1850

The Whitehurst Studio produced this photographic portrait of William Henry Powell sometime in the 1850s. Powell was a painter, but this image, made by a commercial studio, presents him to us as a figure of social standing as much as a creative individual. The accoutrements of bourgeois life are all here: the dark waistcoat, carefully knotted cravat, and gold watch chain signify a man of some substance. What does it mean to see a painter rendered through the lens of the commercial portrait studio? The rise of photography in the mid-19th century changed the ways people saw themselves. It democratized portraiture, but it also created new social expectations. What we see in this image is a negotiation between artistic identity and middle-class respectability. As historians, we use photographs like this as primary source documents. We look to census data, city directories, and business records, piecing together the complex social and institutional histories that shape the art of the past. In doing so, we can understand how art both reflected and helped to construct the social norms of its time.