Parisian bureaucrat by day and tireless inventor after hours, Hippolyte Bayard (French, 1801-1887) was one of the most important, if lesser-known, pioneers of photography. During his thirty-year career, he invented the direct positive process and several other photographic techniques on paper. This exhibition journeys back to the 19th century to unveil a collection of Bayard's delicately crafted photographs, offering an extraordinarily rare glimpse into his unique processes, subjects, and persistent curiosity. He brought an artistic sensitivity into capturing the first staged self-portraits and set precedents for photography as we know it today.

Press release courtesy J. Paul Getty Museum.