SELF-PORTRAIT AS A DROWNED MAN

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HIPPOLYTE BAYARD

Genre: Self-portrait

Date: 1840

Location: Paris, France

Format: Direct positive

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“Self-portrait as a Drowned Man, or Le Noyé, by Hippolyte Bayard (1801-87) is among the earliest photographic images in existence. It purports to show its creator’s suicide. To ensure his intention was understood, Bayard wrote on the back of the print:

‘The corpse you see here is that of M. Bayard, inventor of the process that has just been shown to you. As far as I know this infatigable experimenter has been occupied for about three years with his discovery. The Government, which has been only too generous to M. Daguerre, has said it can do nothing for M. Bayard, and the poor wretch has drowned himself. Oh the vagaries of human life . . . !’

Bayard was raging against his notion’s lack of recognition of his pivotal role in the birth of photography. His compatriot Louis Daguerre was widely fêted, and the process he created will forever bear his name. However, Bayard’s early experiments with direct positive printing were also valuable, and in 1839 he created what is believed to have been the first public photo exhibition.

Bayard’s response to this perceived justice was at once funny – he did not drown – and challenging in the way it addressed the inherent difficulty of using photographs as evidence. (MH)

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