Post

Re-reading Objectivity by Daston+Galison. Was always curious about images that didn’t make it into the book. This time I’m looking them up (and looking deeper into some that did make it). Keeping a log of them as I go, and figured I would share. First up, Decamps vs Civiale: #histsci 🗃️ #SciArt 🧵

Painting above is "Rocky Bay South of Salerno with View of Capri": hvrd.art/o/165005 D+G quote Henry James saying Decamps "painted, not the thing regarded, but the thing remembered." I chose Rocky Bay because they contrast Decamps' style with that of Aimé Civiale's 1866 Alps photos:

They share the Paris Academie des Sciences' description of his panoramas as "'faithful representations of the accidents' of the earth's surface." They use the contrast to demonstrate how, to many in the mid 19th c., the scientific and artistic selves were "diametrically opposed." (p. 37)

Jan von Brevern wrote about Civiale: doi.org/10.1017/S026... Civiale tried to comprehensively document the Alps in 40 panoramas, over 600 photos. Brevern highlights the utility of the "unexpected" in scientific photos, as supplement to "objective." He took this pic of the pano above:

Eastman Museum has a good collection of digitized Civiale photos: collections.eastman.org/advancedsear...