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areas other than Western Europe and North America,
such as Asia (and especially the Middle East), Japan
and China, South America (and especially Brazil and
Argentina), the Pacifi c, and Southern, Northern and,
especially, Eastern Europe. A classic illustration of this
phenomenon is the ever-growing list of precursors of
photography, with spectacular examples such as that
of the French-Brazilian Hercule Florence, whose early
photographic researches only came to light in the 1970s.
Studies of the reception of photography in Japan and
China have revealed not only previously unknown im-
ages but also signifi cant reactions to and deviations from
the ideas that Western explorers introduced along with
photography. More discoveries are still to be expected
from areas and cultures which, although underdeveloped
and subject to colonial rule—and therefore generally ill-
documented—were nonetheless affected by the spread
of photography: thus the 19th-century African, Carib-
bean and African-American experience of photography,
albeit in colonial and institutional contexts, largely
remains to be investigated. The history of 19th-century
photography has inevitably been written mostly from
the point of view of the powers that often organized
its uses, and much remains to be discovered about the
point(s) of view of its subjects, from colonized nations
to ethnic or political minorities to ordinary men and
women in the leading countries.
Indeed, whereas early scholarship focussed on the
leading nations’ artistic circles, academic institutions,
and cultural and economic centers, the increasing rec-
ognition of the social and local impact of photography
has led to more diversifi ed appraisals. Studies of the
development of photography in regions of France, Great
Britain, or the U.S. may not change the global picture
of how photography was conceptualized or practiced in
the 19th century, but they show how it was transmitted
through society, how it was taken up by local practition-
ers, how these related to centers of business and power,
and how local populations and even individuals—still
neglected in accounts of 19th-century photography—re-
sponded to the possibility of having their pictures taken,
to the kind of spectacles that photography presented
them with, or to the option of going into photography
as a business. Local studies may yet unearth signifi cant
bodies of images, but perhaps more importantly they
contribute to a more concrete understanding of the his-
torical phenomenon of the propagation of photography
in the world, as does the investigation of the social recep-
tion of photography beyond the cultural elites. Although
the intellectual and artistic reception of photography
remains a priority subject, many 19th-century texts show
that it was often infl uenced by the social dimension and
even underwritten by lay discourses and attitudes, as in
the example of pictorialism in its relationship to popular
photography. Even when limiting the scope of relevant
reception to intellectual discourse, the many existing
anthologies show that this fi eld itself is no longer so
unifi ed as it once seemed. Links have been documented
between photography and every aspect of 19th-century
intellectual activity, making it diffi cult to maintain the
bias of earlier historians in favor of the sole discourse
of professional artists, art institutions, and art publica-
tions. Within the sphere of art itself, the relationship
of painters (but also writers) to photography has been
shown to be more diverse and sometimes more technical
than was once thought; meanwhile, it has emerged that
photography came to represent a dividing issue, or an
organizing model, in debates on realism, representation,
the goals and values of art, or methods of documentation
and teaching. Meanwhile, studies on scientifi c and insti-
tutional uses of photography have shown that the general
enthusiasm of 19th-century scientists for photography
left room for reticence, even opposition, and sometimes
for elaboration of specific photographic methods.
Conversely, when such methodological adaptation did
not take place, it appears that the use of photography
was often self-justifi ed and resulted in countless sup-
posedly documentary archives—such as ethnographic
and geographical collections, and medical or police
records—with little or no scientifi c justifi cation, and
which perhaps for this reason have come to be regarded
as a cultural and artistic heritage. Many 20th-century
(re)discoveries of 19th-century photographic oeuvres
have highlighted work that was done outside of the
established professions and institutions of art, as in the
example of expeditionary photography, which was not
generally appreciated in major artistic circles, and which
has come to be considered an important fi eld. In sum, the
scope of the inquiry into intellectual and artistic recep-
tion has broadenend, and traditional divisions between
art and science, or art and picture-making, have been
increasingly called into question. This broadening has
remained limited (many ordinary, anonymous or vulgar
photographs have not been given much attention), and it
has not seriously challenged the hierarchy of confi rmed
photographic masters—which was, in part, already in
place in the 19th century, and then took a more defi nitive
shape between 1900 and 1950 under the infl uence of
collectors, avant-garde critics, and a few museums; but
it has enriched and renewed the global understanding of
the 19th century’s experience of photography.
It should be emphasized, by way of conclusion, that
this experience cannot be summarized by simplistic
views about a naively enthusiastic 19th century, some-
times represented as a kind of Dark Age of photography,
imbued with technical secrets, intense commercialism,
and naive conceptions of truth and art. The reevaluation
of 19th-century photographic oeuvres has too often been
governed by the assumption that such oeuvres were
not duly recognized in their day, and that 19th-century