Julia Margaret Cameron
Rosalba (Cyllena Wilson)

Public Domain

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Artist Julia Margaret Cameron (British, born India, 1815–1879)British, born India, 1815–1879

CultureBritish

Titles

Rosalba (Cyllena Wilson)

Date1867

MediumAlbumen silver print from glass negative

DimensionsImage: 14 × 11 1/16 in. (35.5 × 28.1 cm)
Sheet: 14 × 11 1/16 in. (35.6 × 28.1 cm)
Mount: 20 15/16 × 16 7/8 in. (53.2 × 42.9 cm)

Credit LineMuseum purchase funded by the Brown Foundation Accessions Endowment, The Manfred Heiting Collection

Object number2004.335

Not on view

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Department

Photography

Special Collections

Manfred Heiting Collection of Photography

Object Type

PHOTOGRAPHS

DescriptionOne of the greatest portraitists in the history of photography—indeed in any medium—Julia Margaret Cameron blended an unorthodox technique, a profoundly spiritual sensibility, and a Pre-Raphaelite–inflected aesthetic to create a gallery of vivid portraits and a mirror of the Victorian soul. Condemned by some contemporaries for sloppy craftsmanship, she purposely avoided the perfect resolution and minute detail that professional portrait studios strove for, opting instead for carefully directed light, soft focus, and long exposures that allowed her sitters’ slight movements to register in her pictures, instilling them with a sense of breath and life. Cameron’s male subjects included a host of Victorian luminaries such as Charles Darwin, to whom she gave this print. Her female subjects, by contrast, were most often relatives, neighbors, or household servants, portrayed in the guise of literary, historical, or biblical characters. In this close-up portrait, Cameron presented her adopted daughter Cyllena Wilson as Rosalba, a young bride torn between duty and desire in the play The Virgin Widow by the photographer’s close friend Sir Henry Taylor.
ProvenanceEx-collection descendants of Charles Darwin; [Hans P. Kraus, Jr., Inc., New York];
purchased by Manfred Heiting, July 25, 1989; purchased by MFAH, 2004.
Exhibition History"At the Still Point", Paris Photo, Caroussel de Louvre, Paris, 1997.

“History of Photography I: Selections from the Museum's Collection,” The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, November 1, 2014–February 22, 2015.

"Judy Chicago: Herstory," New Museum of Contemporary Art, New York, October 12, 2023–January 14, 2024. (OL.1636)
Inscriptions, Signatures and Marks

Inscribed verso of mount, in pencil, upper right: "Rosalba (Cyllene Wilson) 1867"
Blind stamp lower center of mount recto: "Registered Photograph // sold by // Messrs Colnaghi // 14 Pall Mall East // London"
Inscribed in pencil, verso of mount, lower left: "X2331"

Catalogue raisonné2003, plate 509

Cataloguing data may change with further research.

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