Public collection via the Cleveland Museum of Art
AT-00012950Queen of the May
About the Artwork
A major figure in the development of British photography, Cameron elevated the portrait to new artistic heights. She never opened a commercial studio or accepted commissions, but she was one of the first photographers to sell her photographs through a fine art gallery. Friends, neighbors, family, and servants were cajoled into modeling for portraits as themselves and as allegorical figures from history, religion, mythology, and literature. Little is known about Emily Peacock, who posed here as the protagonist in The May Queen by Britain’s poet laureate Alfred Tennyson. Typically crowned with flowers, the May Queen is selected as part of the celebrations on May 1, a traditional spring holiday in many cultures in the Northern Hemisphere.
Inscriptions
Written in brown ink on recto: "From Life Registered Photograph Copyright Julia Margaret Cameron Freshwater, May 1875 / 'For I'm [underlined] to be the Queen O the May-Mother' / 'I'm to be Queen O' 'the May'/ For the beloved Invalid."; in pencil on verso: "oak & gilt"; "248 [circled]"; "-79-1749"
Exhibition history
Year in Review for 1984. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (April 3-May 5, 1985). Legacy of Light: Master Photographs from the Cleveland Museum of Art. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (November 24, 1996-February 2, 1997). Cheating Death: Portrait Photography’s First Half Century. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (October 22, 2016-February 5, 2017).
Data retrieved from the Cleveland Museum of Art on October 8, 2026. The museum may have updated its record since.
Quick Overview
- Artist
- Julia Margaret Cameron (British, 1815–1879)
- Date
- 1875
- Medium
- albumen print from wet collodion negative
- Dimensions
- Image: 34.9 x 26.6 cm (13 3/4 x 10 1/2 in.); Matted: 66 x 55.9 cm (26 x 22 in.)
- Type
- Photograph
- Classification
- Photograph
- Department
- Photography
- Credit line
- John L. Severance Fund
- Accession no.
- 1984.166
More by Julia Margaret Cameron in museum collections
Open-access museum record · AT-00012950
Powered by Art Trackers