Victorian Women Pioneered Photocollage Decades Before Dada and Surrealism

Key facts

• Photocollage originated as an aristocratic female pastime in Victorian England around 1860, not with early 20th-century avant-gardes.
• The technique involved combining photographic elements with painted backgrounds, often placing human figures in fantastical settings or animal bodies.
• Cartes de visite, small photographic portraits (about 6x9 cm) mounted on card, were invented in 1854 by French photographer André Adolphe Eugène Disdéri.
• The spread of cartes de visite led to 'cartomania,' the collecting and exchanging of these cards, which made photography affordable and inspired photocollage.
• Key works include Kate Edith Gough's 'Which is which' (1870) and 'Anatre' (ca. 1870) at the Victoria & Albert Museum, London.
• Frances Elizabeth, Viscountess Jocelyn created a diamond-shaped arrangement of nine Palmerston family portraits with a painted cherry blossom frame in 1860.
• Marie-Blanche Hennelle Fournier's page from the 'Madame B' album (1870-1880) is held at the Art Institute of Chicago.
• German Dadaists John Heartfield and Hannah Höch coined the term 'photomontage' and transformed the technique into a tool for social critique and political propaganda.