JAVANESE PRINCE, SON OF THE REGENT OF BANDUNG IN BRIDEGROOM’S DRESS C.1865, ISIDORE VAN KINSBERGEN, ALBUMEN SILVER PHOTOGRAPH, 13.5 X 18 CM. NATIONAL GALLERY OF AUSTRALIA, CANBERRA – TAASA Review March 2014

What made the most difference to the commercialisation of photography from the 1860s was the world-wide craze for collecting celebrity portraits and exotic ‘types’, made possible by the availability of cheap portraits on paper.

In an Imperialist era, the popularity of images of exotic royals in colonial domains encouraged travelling photographers or those in foreign ports, to add these images to their inventory. In 1859 French photographer AAE Disderi marketed portraits of Louis Napoleon III in the new miniature calling card sized carte de visite (cdv) format he had introduced in 1854, and in 1860 John Mayall marketed a set of cdv portraits of the British Royal Family in a special album that sold in hundreds of thousands all over the anglophile world.

Practitioners of the new vocation of ‘daguerreian artist’, ‘photographist’ and finally ‘photographer’ were quick to apply ‘By Royal Appointment’ to their products as soon as a royal client patronised their services...