About this artwork
Socially well connected and prominent in photographic circles, Roger Fenton was commissioned to document the British military during the Crimean War. He spent March through June 1855 with the troops, producing 350 wet-plate glass negatives in his horse-drawn darkroom; they were later shown in exhibitions and published in portfolios for purchase. Because of technical limitations and his presumed upper-end clientele, these earliest images of war do not depict death and battle, but rather a more civilized—even languid, as seen here—view of the conflict. Hugh Edwards maintained that practicing photographers and the public needed to learn from past masters, and he acquired two albums of Fenton’s Crimean photographs.
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Status
- Currently Off View
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Department
- Photography and Media
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Artist
- Roger Fenton
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Title
- A Quiet Day in the Mortar Battery
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Place
- England (Artist's nationality)
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Date
- Made 1855
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Medium
- Salted paper print, from the album "Photographic Pictures of the Seat of War in the Crimea" (1856)
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Inscriptions
- Printed recto, on mount, lower left, in black ink: "Deposé"; recto, on mount, lower right, in black ink: "A quiet day in the Mortar Battery."; recto, on mount, along bottom edge, in black ink: "Photographed by R. Fenton. Manchester, Published by T. Agnew & Sons Jan'y 1st 1856. / London, P. & D. Colnaghi H[?] Paris, Moulin, 23, Rue Richer New York, Williams H[?]"; unmarked verso
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Dimensions
- Image/paper: 24 × 34.6 cm (9 1/2 × 13 5/8 in.); Mount: 41.7 × 53 cm (16 7/16 × 20 7/8 in.)
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Credit Line
- Photography Gallery Fund
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Reference Number
- 1959.611.4
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IIIF Manifest
- https://api.artic.edu/api/v1/artworks/146079/manifest.json
Extended information about this artwork
Object information is a work in progress and may be updated as new research findings emerge. To help improve this record, please email . Information about image downloads and licensing is available here.
