coming spring 2021 from university of illinois press!
photographic presidents:
making history from daguerreotype to digital
available for pre-order SOON!
...An original journey through political history, Photographic Presidents reveals the intertwined evolution of an American institution and a medium that continues to define it.
Throughout U.S. history, presidents have participated in photography as subjects, producers, and consumers of photographs. Yet surprisingly, no one has written a comprehensive history of the ways that presidents have engaged with photography. Photographic Presidents is the first study of how presidents shaped and participated in transformative moments in the history of the medium: the rise of the daguerreotype portrait after 1839, the dawn of the “halftone era” in the late nineteenth century, the emergence of so-called “candid camera” photography in the late 1920s, and the digital revolution of the early twenty-first century. From daguerreotypes to selfies, from the earliest photographs printed in newspapers to online slideshows, technological developments transformed our practices of photography and introduced new visual values to the medium. Stories of presidents’ participation in photography offer a compelling lens through which to study how these new visual values played out in public.
Cara Finnegan blends curiosity and imagination with rigorous research to tell original stories about the history of photography. She is the author of Picturing Poverty: Print Culture and FSA Photographs (Smithsonian Books, 2003) and Making Photography Matter: A Viewer's History from the Civil War to the Great Depression (University of Illinois Press, 2015). Finnegan's ideas about photography and visual politics have been featured in a variety of media outlets, such as the New York Times, Vox, and the BBC. In addition to her work on historical images, she co-hosts Chatting The Pictures, a popular webcast that analyzes news photos and contemporary visual politics.
Looking for more commentary on presidents and photography? Check out these recent video clips from the Chatting The Pictures webcast:
Chatting the Pictures special episode with Pete Souza: Photographing presidential leadership in times of crisis (April 2020)
Chatting the Pictures of Trump at Mt. Rushmore (July 2020)
Chatting the Pictures of Kamala Harris's VP Nod (August 2020)
Chatting the Pictures of Trump's Naturalization Ceremony at the GOP Convention (Sept. 2020)
Throughout U.S. history, presidents have participated in photography as subjects, producers, and consumers of photographs. Yet surprisingly, no one has written a comprehensive history of the ways that presidents have engaged with photography. Photographic Presidents is the first study of how presidents shaped and participated in transformative moments in the history of the medium: the rise of the daguerreotype portrait after 1839, the dawn of the “halftone era” in the late nineteenth century, the emergence of so-called “candid camera” photography in the late 1920s, and the digital revolution of the early twenty-first century. From daguerreotypes to selfies, from the earliest photographs printed in newspapers to online slideshows, technological developments transformed our practices of photography and introduced new visual values to the medium. Stories of presidents’ participation in photography offer a compelling lens through which to study how these new visual values played out in public.
Cara Finnegan blends curiosity and imagination with rigorous research to tell original stories about the history of photography. She is the author of Picturing Poverty: Print Culture and FSA Photographs (Smithsonian Books, 2003) and Making Photography Matter: A Viewer's History from the Civil War to the Great Depression (University of Illinois Press, 2015). Finnegan's ideas about photography and visual politics have been featured in a variety of media outlets, such as the New York Times, Vox, and the BBC. In addition to her work on historical images, she co-hosts Chatting The Pictures, a popular webcast that analyzes news photos and contemporary visual politics.
Looking for more commentary on presidents and photography? Check out these recent video clips from the Chatting The Pictures webcast:
Chatting the Pictures special episode with Pete Souza: Photographing presidential leadership in times of crisis (April 2020)
Chatting the Pictures of Trump at Mt. Rushmore (July 2020)
Chatting the Pictures of Kamala Harris's VP Nod (August 2020)
Chatting the Pictures of Trump's Naturalization Ceremony at the GOP Convention (Sept. 2020)
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