176 Chestnut Street, Philadelphia, USA
(Robert Cornelius / Library of Congress)
Robert Cornelius was thirty when he took this striking Daguerreotype photograph in the rear of his father’s shop at 176 Chestnut Street, Philadelphia. The exposure time meant Cornelius needed to remain static for around five minutes before replacing the lens cap. When he did so, he had created what is now widely believed to be the first photographic self-portrait.
At his retirement at the age of sixty-eight in 1877, Cornelius had created a thriving business. But not in photography – although he did create a portraiture business, he abandoned it after two years and returned to his father’s lamp company, steering it to become America’s biggest lighting business.
‘You will notice the figure is not in the center of the plate. The reason for it is, I was alone, and ran in front of the camera after preparing it for the picture, and I could not know until the picture was taken that I was not in the center.
I am fully of the impression that I was the first to obtain a likeness of the human face.’
Robert Cornelius,
American Journal of Photography
