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Unknown Male Sitter
About the Artwork
Almost all early photographers relied on daylight as their sole lighting source. Adam-Salomon’s special lighting techniques yielded a rich tonal range and cast his sitters’ features into relief. A ground-glass ceiling in his studio offered an even, overall light that he accented with side light from glass wall areas that could be covered or filtered by curtains. Initially a sculptor, Adam-Salomon borrowed heavily from the conventions of portrait painting, aggrandizing his subjects by setting them amid luxurious objects and grand architectural features that may or may not have related to their lives. He produced such elegant, large prints in his Parisian portrait studio that he was able to charge four times more than his most able competitors.
Inscriptions
Printed in black ink on recto of mount: "Photographié par le sculpteur Adam-Salomon, r. de Larochefoucauld, 58, Paris"; written in pencil on verso of mount: "5 [circled]"; "1771/g"
Exhibition history
19th-Century French Portrait Photography from the Cleveland Museum of Art. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (May 27-August 9, 2000). Drawn with Light: Pioneering French Photography from the Cleveland Museum of Art. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (February 26-June 16, 2005). Cheating Death: Portrait Photography’s First Half Century. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (October 22, 2016-February 5, 2017).
Quick Overview
- Artist
- Antoine-Samuel Adam-Salomon (French, 1818–1881)
- Date
- c. 1860
- Medium
- albumen print from wet collodion negative
- Dimensions
- Image: 24.4 x 18.8 cm (9 5/8 x 7 3/8 in.); Matted: 61 x 50.8 cm (24 x 20 in.)
- Type
- Photograph
- Classification
- Photograph
- Department
- Photography
- Credit line
- John L. Severance Fund
- Accession no.
- 1996.356
More by Antoine Samuel Adam-Salomon in museum collections
Data retrieved from the Cleveland Museum of Art on October 8, 2026. The museum may have updated its record since.
Open-access museum record · AT-00012970
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