[Sleeping Cat]

Calvert Richard Jones

1850–55 · Salted paper print from glass negative · Photographs

Many of Jones's pictures were made with commercial distribution in mind; the photographer hoped to contribute images to Talbot's "Pencil of Nature" and to the stock of prints for sale at Henneman's Reading establishment. In this picture, however, we see the opposite aspect of Jones's production, the work of an amateur delighting in the camera's ability to capture the intimate aspects of domestic life and to translate them into novel pictorial terms.

Artist

Calvert Richard Jones

Date

1850–55

Medium

Salted paper print from glass negative

Department

Photographs

Credit line

Gilman Collection, Purchase, Ann Tenenbaum and Thomas H. Lee Gift, 2005