Keith de Lellis Gallery presents “PHOTOGRAPHING THE INVISIBLE”, 19th century Spirit Photographs from the collection of Cyril Permutt. Cyril Permutt was a latter day spirit photographer, as well as an author and historian on the subject. In the mid-twentieth century he amassed a collection of early spirit photographs made by some of the most important figures of their day.

Photography was a relatively new medium at a time when enterprising photographers, both here and abroad, gained notoriety for capturing phenomena invisible to the naked eye- the Spirit World. Members of this small, disparate group of artists were given the unholy moniker “spiritualist” for their purportedly “scientific” recording of the super-natural operating in a natural world. Created with what was considered a scientific instrument at the time, the surreal camera images were foisted upon a gullible public. The notion that the invisible could be made visible must have seemed entirely plausible to a large segment of the populace that witnessed firsthand the birth of photography and the other technological marvel, telegraphy- both inventions that heralded a new era in communications.

William Mumler, an American, was the earliest photographer known to produce spirit photographs. His initial foray into spirit photography in Boston in 1861 became an enterprise that he subsequently reincarnated in New York City. Mumler catered to devotees that were willing to pay a stiff premium to have the unseen-departed materialize in their carte-de-visite portrait sittings. In less than ten years, he was prosecuted for public fraud, larceny, and obtaining money under false pretenses. In his highly publicized court trial in 1869, Mumler was acquitted of all charges for lack of evidence. Unsurprisingly, Harper’s Weekly chronicled the affair in an article that recounted witnesses who were willing to vouch for the existence of spirits and the authenticity of his work.

Mumler’s imagery, with its barely perceptible ghostly forms floating in the background, displays the subtlest renderings within the genre. In a particularly arresting composition, a spiritual medium named “Mrs. Charter”, plies her trade through the mental transference of a request to the spirit in attendance. In compliance, the child spirit rests one hand on the medium’s shoulder, while the other touches a small bouquet of flowers held by Mrs.Charter.

Frederick Hudson was the first-known photographer in England to produce spirit photographs. Séances conducted in Hudson’s studio became the subject of spiritual medium Georgiana Houghton’s book, “Chronicles of the Photographs of Spiritual Beings and Phenomena Invisible to the Material Eye”, published in 1882. In it, she marveled about her ability to induce the dearly departed to make themselves manifest on Hudson’s negatives. The spirit forms are much more distinctly rendered as well as fully documented in Hudson’s work than in the work of his fellow practitioners, thanks in part to Georgiana’s painstaking attention to detail, recording the identities of the souls she encountered as well as the supernatural occurrences that transpired during Hudson’s sittings.

John Beattie, another English practitioner, produced some of the most alluring, amorphous images of the time, depicting a maelstrom of spirits, swirling about, or enveloping and obscuring the earthly sitters conducting a séance in their midst.

Although spirit photography was a mere footnote in the history of the medium, it survives as a fascinating relic of the Victorian Era. Its relevance to contemporary art compels one to look at this underappreciated application with fresh eyes. These early images resonate both conceptually and aesthetically in the work of more recent photographers like Clarence John Laughlin, Francesca Woodman, Duane Michaels, and Adam Fuss, to name a few.