Cleveland Museum of Art

Clara L. White as a Child

Date

1885–86

Medium

Matte collodion with hand-applied crayon and paint

Culture

America

Department

Photography

Institution

Cleveland Museum of Art

Virtuoso painting is possible on this very intimate scale, yielding an image that lies on the border between the worlds of photography and the painted miniature. Because the subject’s name and life dates were written on the back, we have found out that White (1883–1987), who never married, spent her life in the vicinity of Winchester, Connecticut, and worked at least into her late sixties as a stenographer and later, secretary to the principal of a school. There is a black-and-white photograph underneath all the paint here.

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