The following is a guest post by Jonathan Eaker, Reference Librarian, Prints & Photographs Division. Recently while going through some military photos in our collection I came across a set of twelve undigitized group portraits showing African American soldiers at the time of the Spanish American War. The photos launched me on research about a …
In the first entry in this occasional series, Profiling Portraits, we examined occupational portraits, a type of portrait designed to tell the viewer a specific fact about the sitter: their occupation. We will now look at another type of portrait, one which is very popular today, thanks to the advent of smartphones with cameras: self-portraits, …
The following is a guest post by Naomi Subotnick, Liljenquist Fellow, Prints and Photographs Division, Summer 2017. This past summer, I worked as a Liljenquist Fellow in the Prints and Photographs Division of the Library of Congress, where I helped to digitize, catalog, and house recently acquired Civil War-era photographs. Working with the Liljenquist Family …
The basic goal of a portrait is to capture the likeness of the subject. But a portrait can offer a lot more information than simply the shape of a face. As with all visual images, portraits lend themselves to further exploration. Why was the portrait made? What does it tell the viewer about the subject …
With holdings of close to 16 million images, there are always new discoveries to be made in the Prints and Photographs Division. When collections become easier to search through digitization, staff are the first to go digging through the “new” images like kids in a visual candy store. During my exploration of the over 25,000 …
“…the great success of Mr. Bell is due to his suavity of manner coupled with high artistic ability, and to the gentlemanly deportment observed by his corps of assistants. The rule is, politeness to everybody.” –Photographic Times and American Photographer, Sept. 1, 1883. From the 1870s until the 1910s, tens of thousands of people in …
The following is a guest post by Beverly Brannan, Curator of Photography, Prints & Photographs Division. African American women as well as men assumed civic responsibilities in the decades after the Civil War. William Henry Richards (1856-1941) was active in several organizations that promoted civil rights and civil liberties for African Americans at the end …
Have you ever tried to photograph a baby? No easy task! The first challenge is getting him or her to smile, a job at which this photographer is currently failing, despite his best efforts: The second challenge is simply this: young babies cannot sit up on their own. Hence the need for a photographer to …
With the many new faces on Capitol Hill this month as the 114th Congress gets underway, it’s an apt time to revisit the faces and activities of members of Congress of yesteryear. A new guide, “Pictures of Congress: An Overview,” helps researchers do just that. Although the Prints & Photographs Division generally does not receive …
