Photographic Portraiture - a short historical sketch Wolfgang Hastert
2000 years ago •
Sculptures, statues, paintings
Supporters of the portrait arts • Churches, the pope, kings, Medici (Firence) • Tell the story of religion • Elite, upper class, commissioned works • Remember the deceased • Renaissance 15th century
Dramatic lighting
Mona Lisa 1503 – 1517 sfumato/ smoked soft painting
Rembrandt Light
Painting versus photo technique
David Hockney / camera lucida
Chiaroscuro lighting
Tenebrism light – violent contrast and spot light
Specular / contrast lighting
Julia Margaret Cameron 1815 -1879 pictorialist photography
Edward S Curtis 1889 – 1952
$ 75,000.00 in 1906
• Paid by JP Morgan for book series on Native Indians ( 500 images )
August Sander 1876 - 1964
Edward Weston 1886 - 1958
Walker Evans 1903 – 1975 documentary style portraits
Lighting styles derived from painting
• Sfumato
soft
• Chiaroscuro hard light • Tenebrism dramatic chiaroscuro/ spot light
The nature of portraits • Portraits are always about the subject, their likenesses, their personalities, and their lives‌ How about the influence of the photographer ???