MoOPC: The Metropolitan Museum of Art

Wild Fennel, 1841-1842
William Henry Fox Talbot’s earliest pictures “impressed by the agency of light alone,” as he described them, were photographic traces of botanical specimens laid on sheets of chemically sensitized paper and set in the sun. The paper darkened wherever it was struck by light but remained white wherever the sun’s rays were blocked. As a serious botanist, Talbot envisioned the accurate recording and easy sharing of natural specimens to be one of the important functions of his invention.
via The Metropolitan Museum of Art.





