Dead Child On a Sofa, c.1855 (daguerreotype, applied colour, quarter-plate)

This carefully staged daguerreotype of a dead child is an outstanding example of a very common subject: the postmortem portrait. Using the stylistic conventions of the day, the unidentified artist successfully created a visually pleasing scene, despite the nature of the image. Dressed in white with a bouquet of flowers on the chest, the child, seen in profile, reclines on an elaborately patterned sofa. Delicate flesh tones were added to the cheek and arm, suggestive of a healthy child sleeping. The high rate of infant mortality throughout the 19th century made this variety of portraiture common, satisfying the emotional need of the parents to have a lasting memory of a loved one.