The House Painter

A man braces himself on a ladder with his brush freshly dipped into red paint as though he is just about to begin work. At the height of the daguerreotype’s’ popularity in the U.S. from the 1840s–1850s, people would pose for photographs with the tools of their trades. In these occupational portraits, the sitter would mimic the act of their profession, as seen in this staged depiction of a house painter. Although by the mid-1850s exposure times were less than a minute (an eternity by today’s standards) sitters were still required to sit for several seconds, making truly spontaneous poses difficult.