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1849–1918. M., Punctum 2003, 176 pp.
CARTE-DE-VISITE
The carte-de-visite was one of the most popular photo-
graphic formats of the nineteenth century. It consisted of
small portrait photograph, around 9cm by 6cm, pasted
onto a slightly larger piece of card. Carte-de-visites de-
rived their name from the fact that their size gave them
the appearance of a visiting card, a purpose for which
it was rarely, if ever, used.
The advent of the carte-de-visite in the late 1850s
was keyed into photography becoming a public and a
commercial media. It was a format ideally suited for
the dissemination of celebrity images and for the col-
lection of pictures of friends and family in photograph
albums.
There is no single origin for the carte-de-visite. Sir
David Brewster claimed that the idea originated with the
Duke of Parma in 1857, who had his portrait gummed
onto his visiting cards. However, as early as 24 August
1851, a humorous article in La Lumiere included a sug-
gestion by Louis Dodero, an enterprising Marseilles
photographer, that photographs could be placed on
engraving calling cards. A similar suggestion also ap-
peared in the American Practical Mechanics Journal in
1855, while Hugh Welch Diamond claimed that he used
a comparable format to present an equestrian photograph
to Queen Victoria in October 1852.
The carte-de-visite was patented by the French
photographer, André Adolphe Eugéne Disdéri, on 27
November 1854. The terms of his patent emphasise
the commercial impetus driving the invention of the
carte; “In order to render photographic prints practical
to commercial needs, it would be necessary to dimin-
ish greatly the cost of production, a result which I have
obtained by my improvements” (Patent no. 21502).
Instead of one large collodion plate being used for a
single photograph, the ingenuity of Disdéri’s design
was that it he exposed ten images on one plate. Each
individual carte was hence reproduced at a fraction of
the cost previously incurred for one full-plate picture.
Having ten pictures upon one plate also dramatically
increased the potential to reproduce a large number of
pictures in a short space of time, a signifi cant factor in
being able to supply a large consumer market.
Disderi’s original patent was slightly modifi ed after
eight images was found to be a more practical number.
In March 1860, a Parisian optician, Hyacinthe Hermagis,
constructed a four lens camera that became the standard
equipment used for carte portraits. The common rate
charged in France was 30F for 25 cartes with two poses,
50F for 50 cartes with three poses, and 70F for 100 cartes
with four poses. In Britain, top quality celebrity cartes
during the 1860s sold for around 1s6d.
The rise of the carte was instrumental in turning
photography into a mass medium. It also helped to dra-
matically increase the number of photographic studios.
A rage for cartes caught on in late 1858 in France and
quickly spread to the rest of Europe. With the pleasure
of seeing photographs of family, friends and celebrities,
often for the fi rst time, collecting cartes became the
latest social fashion. In October 1861, the Art Journal
compared the collection of cartes to an ad infi nitum
multiplication of national portrait galleries because they
were able to be collected in “an unlimited range and in
every possible variety—family-friends, collections of
the portraits of friends, and of celebrities of every rank
and order, both foreign and of our own country.” Cartes
constituted and expressed a collective identity, integrat-
ing public fi gures into the intimate arena of individual
subjectivity.
The format of the carte was important in conditioning
its appeal and ensuring its assimilation into everyday
life. Small, ephemeral commodities which were widely
available, easy to hold, easy to pass around, easy to
look over by the dozen within a drawing-room, cartes
possessed little distinction in themselves. They were
CARRICK, WILLIAM
Deveria, Jacques-Jean-Marie-Achille or Charles-Theodule.
Portrait of a Boy.
The J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles © The J. Paul Getty
Museum.
