Portret van Charlotte Asser c. 1854

This is Eduard Isaac Asser's portrait of Charlotte Asser, a small photograph made with the nineteenth-century technique of daguerreotype. In the Netherlands during this period, photography was just beginning to emerge as both a commercial enterprise and an artistic medium. The daguerreotype, with its sharp detail and silvery surface, captured a sense of realism that was new and exciting. But it was also an expensive process, which made it primarily accessible to the middle class. Given that the sitter here is the artist's relative, we could consider this portrait as an intimate family document rather than a commissioned work. Family archives and studio records are invaluable resources to understand how the rise of photography impacted social dynamics, familial relationships, and the evolving concept of portraiture.