Getty Museum

[Panorama of Niagara Falls]

Date

after 1873

Medium

Albumen silver print

Department

Photographs

Institution

Getty Museum

This three-part panorama, made from the Canadian side of the river, attempts to convey a sense of the grand scale of the falls. Water rushes across the foreground of the first two panels in brisk, muted strokes, giving a dynamic sense of the river water as it streams south after its recent, precipitous plunge. This muted quality is due to the length of the exposure. The longer the exposure of a moving object, the less crisply it appears in the image. In the lower left corner of the third frame, the water breaks over the falls in a burst of exuberance, looking like a cumulous cloud of smoke.

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