Roger Fenton

Roger Fenton achieved widespread fame for his coverage of the Crimean War, as it was the first extensive photographic documentation of a war. "The Valley of the Shadow of Death" is regarded as one of the most important photographs of war that has ever been recorded. However, the Crimean photographs account for only a small section of the thousands that he produced, and of the many subjects in which he took an interest.

Fenton's work was greatly admired by Queen Victoria, and he was commissioned to take portraits of the royal family. He traveled and photographed extensively in the United Kingdom and Russia. He also photographed still lifes and landscapes. These landscapes, full of Romantic poetic sensibility, may be the greatest tribute to his art, revealing the audacity and innovation of his vision, together with a sense of serene harmony. They provide a unique view of the Victorian aesthetic.

In an introductory essay, Richard Pare provides an account of the artist's life, and his many and varied contributions to the art of photography.

Roger Fenton, born in Lancashire, England, was one of the pioneering forces in the nascent photographic world of the nineteenth century. Although he studied painting in Paris under Paul Delaroche, he soon became a champion of the new medium of photography. In 1847, he was one of the founding members of the Photographic Club, the first photographic society in Britain, and probably in the world. He was also responsible for the formation of the Royal Photographic Society. During his career, which lasted for ten years from 1852, he covered an unusually diverse and extensive range of subject matter, and earned a prominent place among the few universal photographers.

Richard Pare, author of the text, has been Curator of Photography for the Canadian Center for Architecture in New York since its inception in 1974.