Customer Reviews

Playing with Pictures: The Art of Victorian Photocollage (Art Institute of Chicago)

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I really enjoyed this exhibit at the Art Institute of Chicago. The creative things that the Victorians did with the cartes de visite that they collected are interesting, amusing, and sometimes surprising. The women (and men) that created these albums took blank pages and painted a backdrop or design to insert the photographs. They have unique themes, one of my favorites being a spider web. There are several juxtapositions that seem almost bizarre (peoples faces on duck bodies). This was the way these photographs were kept and arranged to show and to share with friends. Another of my favorite pages is one that contains a poem... basically stating that if you view this album you should know that your picture will be added to it. I find photocollage to be almost an ancestor to the modern scrapbooking trend, but so much better in that the backgrounds were all hand painted.

This coffee table book presents the history of photocollage in Victorian times, when photographs had become inexpensive enough to use in whimsical art pieces that reflected the sensibilities of the times. An interesting survey of what was a primarily female pastime of creating and sharing albums, mixing images to create fantastic new landscapes. The essays are fascinating, and the reproductions are unusual and high quality. Sure to please those with interests in Victorian art, photography, collage, and even modern scrapbooking.

Excellent for scrap-booking ideas. From an exhibit of the Met Museum in NYC in 2010. The essay content is academic, but accessible and terribly interesting. Photocollage, before Picasso famously glued a piece of paper to a painting, was a hobby enjoyed by upper class Victorian women (and men) in the 1800s. A woman's collection was used as a center piece for conversation...even used as a vehicle for flirting, or political voice... eg, the stern head of a Royal would be placed on a water color painting of a dandy entering the hostesses drawing room; members of a rich family cut out and place ironically in a bleak water color painting of city squalor. For teenagers/ college students, it's a great source for Victorian history...not stuff you'd find on the internet.

A visually wonderful book - a must have for collage artist, collectors of Victorian imagery, and scrapbookers!

This book reveals the talents of women at the turn of the century who used family photos to add to their drawings. The techniques employed are as timely and masterful today as they were in the 1800s. And the humor involved in these pieces is amusing.

The exhibit at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York displays the pieces in the book and is a must for anyone visiting the area.