There are many known portraits of Charles Darwin.
Darwin came from a wealthy family and became a well-known naturalist and author, and
portrait
A portrait is a portrait painting, painting, portrait photography, photograph, sculpture, or other artistic representation of a person, in which the face and its expressions are predominant. The intent is to display the likeness, Personality type ...
s were made of him in childhood, adulthood and old age. Darwin's life (1809–1882) spanned the
development of photography, and early portraits of Darwin are drawn or painted, while many later portraits are monochrome photographs. After the publication and dissemination of the controversial ''
On the Origin of Species
''On the Origin of Species'' (or, more completely, ''On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection, or the Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life''),The book's full original title was ''On the Origin of Species by Me ...
'' in 1859, Darwin was also the subject of
numerous caricatures.
Darwin's visage, particularly his iconic beard, continues to be culturally significant and widely recognisable into the 21st century. According to historian Janet Browne, Darwin's capacity to commission photographs of himself—and their widespread reproduction as
carte de visite
The ''carte de visite'' (, visiting card), abbreviated CdV, was a type of small photograph which was patented in Paris by photographer André Adolphe Eugène Disdéri in 1854, although first used by Louis Dodero. Each photograph was the size o ...
and
cabinet card photographs—helped to cement the lasting connection between Darwin and the theory of evolution in popular thought (largely to the exclusion of the many others who also contributed to the development of evolutionary theory), especially as these portraits were reinterpreted in caricature. At that time few could afford to commission portrait photographs, and this gave Darwin an advantage in gaining public recognition.
Especially in his last decades as
his illness progressed, Darwin expressed frustration about sitting for photographs. He turned down an opportunity in 1869 to sit for a portrait with
Alfred Russel Wallace
Alfred Russel Wallace (8 January 1823 – 7 November 1913) was a British naturalist, explorer, geographer, anthropologist, biologist and illustrator. He is best known for independently conceiving the theory of evolution through natural se ...
, explaining that sitting for photographs "is what I hate doing & wastes a whole day owing to my weak health; and to sit with another person would cause still more trouble & delay." Nevertheless, there are at least 53 known photographs of Darwin, according to
Gene Kritsky, a scholar of Darwin photos.
[ Richard Milner,]
Charles Darwin: The Last Portrait
", ''Scientific American'', November 1995, pp. 78–79.
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Chronological list of portraits
References
External links
Charles Robert Darwin– National Portrait Gallery, London
Photographs– The Complete Work of Charles Darwin Online
– Catalog of reproductions and derivatives of Darwin's image
Darwin portraits– University of Oklahoma Libraries, History of Science Collections
– Wellcome Images
*"
ttps://web.archive.org/web/20090114094912/http://www.theonion.com/content/news/evolutionists_flock_to_darwin Evolutionists Flock To Darwin-Shaped Wall Stain, ''
The Onion'', 5 September 2008.
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