Sixth Plate

LEFT ALONE. I don’t think that I have ever seen a retaped sixth size dag with a tiny boy seated inside a huge area of space where the boy seemed to be waiting for the grown ups to return and pay attention to him. Maybe the maker used this ruse to fool the kid into sitting still. He asked the parents to exit the room and then he uncapped his lens and began walking away too. Only to return a few seconds later while triumphantly uttering, “gotcha that time you clever kid”! The daguerreian had used a heavy handed buff stroke to prepare the silver, however even with the speckled tarnish and overexposure (making the child’s face light blue) he isn’t any less compelling to me. His shirt and trousers were rather fashionable circa 1846. A complete leather case contains the tyke.