The nineteenth century was a remarkable period in art history during which the practices of painting, printmaking and photography intersected in new and unexpected ways. Massive changes in the technology of reproduction took place, and France in particular became a leading testing ground for new printing and photographic techniques. This abundantly illustrated book investigates for the first time the complex and lively interactions between painting, printmaking and photography in France during the 1800s. Cultural historian Stephen Bann explores why rising reproductive media did not supplant traditional modes and how, instead, printmakers, photographers and painters influenced and inspired each other's work, together creating a visual culture of unique richness and breadth. The book focuses especially on pictorial reproduction involving painting, printmaking and photography in combination. Bann includes in the discussion the interweaving careers of Ingres and such contemporary painters as Vernet and Delaroche, such printmakers as lithographer Nicolas Charlet and engraver Luigi Calamatta and such pioneering photographers as Niepce, Daguerre and Robert Bingham. Setting the nineteenth-century issues of reproduction in the context of art history and theory, Bann also offers insights into the nature of art reproduction in our own era of radically changing reproduction technology.

Stephen Bann is professor of history of art at the University of Bristol, England and the author of several books on nineteenth-century France.