Cited by 1Photographic and Visual ArtsLaw in Society and CulturePhotography and Visual Culture

The DOI matches its Crossref record; 32 of the 32 references it cites were found in a registry or an index; 1 of the 34 sources its claims cite were checked for support.

A previously unexplored encounter: the English judiciary, carte de visite and photography as a form of mass media

Open access
Moran, Leslie J.·2018·International Journal of Law in Context

Abstract

Studies exploring the link between the representation of judges, photography and mass media tend to focus on the appearance of cameras in courtrooms and the reproduction of the resulting photographs in the press at the beginning of the twentieth century. But more than fifty years separate these developments from the birth of photography in the late 1830s. This study examines a previously unexplored encounter between the English judiciary and photography that began in the 1860s. The pictures where known as ‘carte de visite’. They were the first type of photographic image capable of being mass produced. It is a form of photography that, for a period of almost twenty years, attracted a frenzy of interest. Drawing upon a number of archives, including the library of Lincoln's Inn, London's National Portrait Gallery and my own personal collection this paper has two objectives. The first is to examine the carte portraits of senior members of the judiciary that were produced during that time. What appears within the frame of this new form of judicial portraiture? Of particular interest is the impact the chemical and technological developments that come together in carte photographs had on what appears within the frame of portraits. The second objective is to examine the manner in which they were displayed. This engages a commonplace of scholarship on portraiture; the location and mode of display shape the meaning of what lies within the frame of the picture. Carte portraits were produced with a particular display in mind: the album. They were to be viewed not in isolation, but as part of an assemblage of portraits. Few albums survive. Those that do offer a rare opportunity to examine the way carte portraits of judges were used and the meanings they generated through their display. Three albums containing carte portraits of judges will be considered.

Overview

AI snapshot

Written from the paper’s full text.

TL;DR

The paper examines carte de visite portraits of senior English judges from the 1860s as an early mass-media photography phenomenon, analyzing what appears within the frame and how album display shaped meaning. Through three surviving albums, it argues these portraits both reproduced state-portraiture conventions and made judicial authority more ordinary, intimate, and commercially visible.

Key findings

  • Carte de visite were the first mass-produced photographic images: an estimated 300–400 million cartes were sold in England between 1862 and 1866, and up to 4 million cartes of Queen Victoria were sold between 1860 and 1862; 1866 copyright records list 44 carte portraits of Victoria, 77 of the Prince of Wales, and 70 of Princess Alexandra.
  • Judicial cartes often follow state-portraiture conventions—robes, wigs, regalia, plain backgrounds—but also include civilian/bourgeois informal portraits; their small size (about 89 by 58 mm) and photographic detail produced experiences of proximity, intimacy, and “warts and all” openness.
  • Three albums show different imagined communities: the Effie Chitty album (48 pages, 135 portraits) domesticates judicial portraits into genealogy; Lincoln’s Inn “Album 2” (34 pages, 91 carte portraits and 2 cabinet cards, 82 sitters identified as judicial office-holders) displays legal professional hierarchy as family; the NPG “Tichborne Claimant Trial Album” (50 pages, 148 carte portraits; 14 judge portraits, 12 in state-portrait style) places judges within a Grangerised civil-society display and courtroom drama.
  • Studios commodified judges’ “attention capital”: an 1866 S.B. Beal catalogue listed judicial cartes for sale, and Cockburn’s Tichborne role included a 188-day criminal trial, an 800-page summary reported in newspapers for eighteen days, and later publication as a book.

Methods

  • Archival and visual study drawing on Lincoln’s Inn library (over 400 carte portraits, many of judges), London’s National Portrait Gallery, and the author’s personal collection purchased via eBay.
  • Close analysis of three albums containing carte portraits of judges: the Effie Chitty album, Lincoln’s Inn “Album 2,” and the NPG “Tichborne Claimant Trial Album.”
  • Interpretive historical analysis of composition within the frame and of album curation/display, using portraiture scholarship on state portraiture, Grangerising, and carte-album practices rather than quantitative methods.

Limitations

  • The paper states that few carte albums survive; provenance for “Album 2” is little known; the Tichborne album’s title is misleading because most portraits are unrelated to the case; primary versus secondary market production is often impossible to distinguish; cartes lack dates and captions may have been added or amended later.
  • Evident from the text: the analysis rests on three surviving albums plus the author’s personal collection, so it is not a representative sample; there is no systematic sampling or quantitative coding, and claims about the meanings generated by display are interpretive.

Model-written summary. Check it against the paper before relying on it.

Integrity signals

Registry

Crossref · 10.1017/s174455231800023x

Cites

32 of 32 references verified0 citation errors · 0 not checkable

Statistics

Nothing to recompute.

Verification

Claims the paper makes

72 Own interpretation · 32 No basis given · 19 Sources not found · 14 Own result · 12 No full text of the sources · 11 Not checked yet · 1 Partly supported · accuracy not yet measured

  • Probably not a substantial claim. 96
  • It may state two separate claims as one. 35
106 of 106
  • The paper relies on this without support.

    Few albums containing carte portraits survive.

    “Few albums survive.”
  • The paper relies on this without support.

    The carte photograph was introduced into England in 1857.

    “The carte photograph was introduced into England in 1857.”
  • The paper relies on this without support.

    The small size of carte portraits was characterised as one of their failings.

    “The small size of carte portraits was also characterised as one of their failings.”
3 of 3

Self-check

Percentages, sums and reported differences re-computed from the paper’s own numbers.

Each contradiction between two passages listed here was confirmed by an independent check.

2 of 2

Citations

Cites

Show all 30 references

Research works printed but not linked: 14

  1. Hargreaves, 2001, The Beautiful and the Damned: The Creation of Identity in the 19th Century, 17
  2. Beal, 1866, Carte de Visite Portraits of the Royal Family Eminent and Celebrated Persons
  3. Darrah, 1981, Carte de Visite in Nineteenth Century Photography
  4. Thompson, 1995, The Media and Modernity
  5. Moran, 2012, Legal Staging: Visualisation – Mediatisation – Ritualisation: Legal Communication through Language, Literature, Media, Art and Architecture, 205
  6. Nead, 2002, Visual cultures of the courtroom: reflections on history, law and the image, Visual Culture in Britain, 3, 119
  7. Holborn G (2013) The Chitty-Pollock legal dynasty. Lincolns Inn Annual Review, 44–46.
  8. Granger, 1769, A Biographical History of England from Egbert the Great the Revolution: Consisting of Characters Disposed in Different Classes and Adapted to a Methodical Catalogue of Engraved British Head Intended as an Essay towards Reducing Biography to System, and a Help to the Knowledge of Portraits, with a Preface Showing the Utility of a Collection of Engraved Portraits to Supply the Defect and Answer the Various Purposes of Medals
  9. Rubin, 2008, Seddon, Dell and rock and roll: investigating alleged breaches on the ban on publishing photographs taken within courts or their precincts, 1925–1967, Criminal Law Review, 11, 874
  10. Keller, 1991, Communications in History: Technology, Culture and Society, 144
  11. Stulik, 2013, Albumen: The Atlas of Analytical Signatures of Photographic Processes
  12. Lumsden, 1999, The true and remarkable history of Andrew Bogle, Jamaican Historical Society Bulletin, 11
  13. Annear, 2002, The Man Who Lost Himself: The Unbelievable Story of the Tichborne Claimant
  14. Jenkins, 1947, The State Portrait: Its Origins and Evolution

Metadata

Authors
Moran, L. J.
Affiliations
Birkbeck, University of London (GB)
Corresponding author
Moran, Leslie J.
Venue
International Journal of Law in Context
Published
2018-11-23
Volume
14
Issue
4
Pages
539-558
ISSN
  • 1744-5523 (ISSN-L)
  • 1744-5531
OpenAlex
W2900926011
Cited by
1
References
30
Citations by year
2022: 1
FWCI
0.00
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
Locations
  • International Journal of Law in Context (publishedVersion)
  • BIROn (Birkbeck, University of London) (acceptedVersion)
Funders
Arts and Humanities Research Council (AH/L007290/1)
Topics
  • Social Sciences › Arts and Humanities › Museology › Photographic and Visual Arts
  • Social Sciences › Law › Law in Society and Culture
  • Social Sciences › Arts and Humanities › History › Photography and Visual Culture
Keywords
carte de visite, English judiciary, mass media, 1860s, senior judges, Lincoln's Inn

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