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Sunday, July 5, 2009 at 11:18PM 
There is more to a picture than first meets the eye. There are many reasons for collecting specific photos. In this case it was not for the young woman’s expression which is not just solemn – there is significant composure in her pose – but a niggling sense that this may be a person who is not very happy at this time in her life (how much can you tell from a single image; my supposition may be entirely unfounded?)
I bought it because it is a very nice image in almost every other way: the composition and exposure are exquisite, her posture is impeccable and oddly relaxed even as it is upright; the dress is a wonderful example of the best of the current fashion, neither overblown or excessively plain (I think just after the bustle craze and before the extreme shoulder and sleeve treatments of the 1890s; note that the styles required skillful alterations for each individual wearer); she may be just above average height.
What a difference it would have made if she had presented just the hint of a smile, or a touch of life to her eyes, or a more congenial softness to her outlook! What you cannot see but I detect at close inspection, is that she is quite heavily freckled; perhaps she is a redhead. I don’t mean to suggest that this is the reason for her demeanor, even though a freckled complexion was what a woman of her time sought to avoid (as was a tan), but some people are freckled even if they stay out of the sun. Little things may color a person’s view of life, but we cannot know if she had far better reasons for looking at the world as she seems to on this day. Her self possession is remarkable though. We do not have a right to happiness, only to the pursuit of happiness.
If she were here she might tell me to mind my own business and keep my pop psychology to myself, thank you very much – and she would have a point, yet I might respond that, more than a century removed, I cannot help but respond to a photo as I would to any stranger on the street (we humans are past masters at reading expressions – it comes with a few hundred thousand years of survival instincts).
This is from the studio of Brittingham & Webster of West Springfield and Ware, MA.
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