*Two* Women to Know: Julia Margaret Cameron & Mary Hillier
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From the first moment, I handled my lens with a tender ardour. — Julia Margaret Cameron (Mary Hillier as Sappho, image via Metropolitan Museum of Art) When Julia Margaret Cameron picked up photography at age 48, she didn't know the "little hobby" would become her life's legacy. The early camera, and particularly her penchant for its soft-focus portraits, widened her social circle considerably. Soon she was salon-ing with the poet Alfred Lord Tennyson, her neighbor on the Isle of Wight; his celebrated cadre of literary friends; famous actors, actresses and noblemen, who paid handsomely for their own Cameron portraits; and among all of these sat Mary Hillier, Cameron's one-time maid and favorite subject.
*Two* Women to Know: Julia Margaret Cameron & Mary Hillier
*Two* Women to Know: Julia Margaret Cameron …
*Two* Women to Know: Julia Margaret Cameron & Mary Hillier
From the first moment, I handled my lens with a tender ardour. — Julia Margaret Cameron (Mary Hillier as Sappho, image via Metropolitan Museum of Art) When Julia Margaret Cameron picked up photography at age 48, she didn't know the "little hobby" would become her life's legacy. The early camera, and particularly her penchant for its soft-focus portraits, widened her social circle considerably. Soon she was salon-ing with the poet Alfred Lord Tennyson, her neighbor on the Isle of Wight; his celebrated cadre of literary friends; famous actors, actresses and noblemen, who paid handsomely for their own Cameron portraits; and among all of these sat Mary Hillier, Cameron's one-time maid and favorite subject.