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| Pierre-Louis Pierson La Marquise Mathilde 1861-66 Metropolitan Museum |
This is the final group of 19th-century albumen-silver photographs made by Pierre-Louis Pierson whose camera was for many years committed to the service of Virginia Oldoini, Countess of Castiglione (1837-1899). She and her extraordinary wardrobe are the true subjects of all these pictures, but filtered through the representation of artfully selected characters from romance and history.
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| Pierre-Louis Pierson La Reine d'Étrurie 1863-67 Metropolitan Museum |
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| Pierre-Louis Pierson Cauchoise 1860s Metropolitan Museum |
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| Pierre-Louis Pierson Les épaules tombantes 1860s Metropolitan Museum |
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| Pierre-Louis Pierson Livetta 1863-66 Metropolitan Museum |
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| Pierre-Louis Pierson Scherzo di Follia 1863-66 Metropolitan Museum |
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| Pierre-Louis Pierson Scherzo di Follia close-up 1863-66 Metropolitan Museum |
During the 1870s and 1880s La Castiglione grew reclusive, we are told, and only ventured out swathed in veils after dark. Then – in the mid-1890s near the end of her life – she summoned the obliging Pierson again and they created a concluding sequence of representations.
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| Pierre-Louis Pierson Rachel 1893 Metropolitan Museum |
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| Pierre-Louis Pierson The Ermine Cape 1895 Metropolitan Museum |
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| Pierre-Louis Pierson from Série des Roses 1895 Metropolitan Museum |
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| Pierre-Louis Pierson from Série des Roses 1895 Metropolitan Museum |
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| Pierre-Louis Pierson from Série des Roses 1895 Metropolitan Museum |