Figure026

Citation

Hathaway (dates Unknown Photographer Photographer). “man in blackface.” circa 1865. Gregory Fried Collection. Mirror of Race, 11 Feb. 2021, mirrorofrace.bc.edu/items/show/255. Accessed 30 Apr. 2024.

Title

man in blackface

Subject

unknown

Creator

Hathaway (dates Unknown Photographer Photographer)

Date

circa 1865

Type

studio portrait

Identifier

Figure026

Rights Holder

Gregory Fried Collection

Original Format

tintype

Physical Dimensions

“gemtype” (0.75 x 1 inch) in a paper mat, cdv standard

Factual Commentary

The photograph above is a tiny tintype portrait of kind known as the “gemtype” (click the image to the left for a close-up). Photographers would use special cameras with as many as 16 lenses to make multiple, postage-stamp-sized photographs on a single thin, metal plate, which the customer could then cut up and give to friends and family. The paper mat holding this one is embossed: “Hathaway, Photographer, Glens Falls,” which is in New York state.

We know nothing about the man in the photograph, except that he is almost certainly a white man in “blackface,” which was a costume popularized by the minstrel shows of mid-19th century America. Blackface consisted of blackening a white person’s face with makeup, such as greasepaint or shoe polish, or even burnt cork. In this photograph the man also wears a wig to mimic the hair of African Americans.

The minstrel show emerged in the United States in the 1830s and became enormously successful as a form of popular entertainment among whites. White performers, both professional and amateur, would wear blackface and perform satirical skits and musical numbers, posing as African Americans.

Interpretive Commentary

One thing to notice about this photograph is that it was made in Glen Falls, New York, around the time of the Civil War.

The extreme racial stereotyping that characterized the minstrel show was very popular in northern regions, and it is important to bear in mind that this form of racism was widespread in the United States. Blackface and the minstrel show was a form of mock reverse passing from white to black. In actual passing, a person attempts to convince others that they embody a different identity than would normally be ascribed to them. But in blackface, white performers played with taking on the persona of blacks for an audience that would still see them as white.

This mock passing played on the fascination with racial boundaries. Comedy works on the borders of hysteria, and blackface touched a nerve by presenting a white person as black, exploiting a deep-seated anxiety about racial identity and purity ― but at the same time, this anxiety would be quelled by the audience knowing the performers was “really” white and by the demeaning representation of blacks, which would reassure them of their distance from the characters depicted. The audience could then return to a reassured sense of possessing their whiteness as a mark of genuine superiority, combined with a feeling of mastery over the black archetypes captured and forced, as the audience saw such performances, to reveal themselves in the caricatured forms of blackface.

Alternative Title

Collection

Mirror of Race