The Photography of Julia Margaret Cameron

"I longed to arrest all the beauty that came before me and at length the longing has been satisfied." - Julia Margaret Cameron

I can't remember how I first discovered Julia Margaret Cameron, but whenever I look again at her photography I'm astounded by it's beauty and intensity. For the era that she lived her portraiture especially is groundbreaking in its immediacy. When you consider that these images were not taken with a click of the button, but with the subjects sitting for the lengthy periods of time necessary in early photography, the intimacy of her work is astounding.

Self Portrait, 1862


Whisper of the Muse, 1865


The Parting of Sir Lancelot and Queen Guinevere, 1874


Sir Galahad and the Nun, 1874


Charles H. Cameron as King Lear, 1872


Elaine, 1875


The May Queen, 1874


Sadness, 1864


The Mountain Nymph, Sweet Liberty, 1866


Julia Jackson, 1867 (mother of Virginia Woolf)


The Gipsy, 1865


Miss Magdalene Brookfield, 1865


Beatrice, 1866


Maud, 1875


Julia and Charles Norman, 1864


The Kiss of Peace, 1869


Gareth and Lynette, 1874


H.W. Longfellow, 1868


Charles Darwin, 1868


Robert Browning, 1865


A. Tennyson, 1865


Prayer, 1866


Paul and Virginia, 1864


Daisy Bradley, 1864


Cupid Reposing, 1872