Plate Number 266. Turning and changing position while on the ground

Art Historical Context

Step into the groundbreaking world of motion photography with *Plate Number 266. Turning and changing position while on the ground* by Eadweard Muybridge, created in 1887. This collotype print, part of Muybridge's monumental *Animal Locomotion* series, captures a sequence of a nude male figure dynamically twisting and shifting on the ground. Measuring 16 × 45.2 cm in its image area, it exemplifies the artist's innovative use of multiple cameras triggered in rapid succession—up to 12 or 24 per second—to freeze and dissect human movement, revolutionizing how we understand the body in action. Muybridge, a British-born pioneer in the American West, developed these techniques after his famous 1870s horse studies debunked myths about equine gallops. Printed via collotype, a photomechanical process prized for its fidelity and tonal range, this plate allowed mass reproduction of his scientific imagery. Housed in the National Gallery of Art's Corcoran Collection, it bridges art and science, influencing early filmmakers like Thomas Edison and the Lumière brothers. Today, this work reminds us of photography's power to reveal the unseen poetry of motion, blending anatomical precision with visual drama for curious eyes.

About the Artist

Eadweard Muybridge · 1830–1904

Eadweard Muybridge (1830-1904) was an English-American photographer who revolutionized the understanding of motion through his pioneering chronophotographic studies. Born Edward James Muggeridge in Kingston upon Thames, England, he emigrated to America and became famous first for his dramatic landscape photographs of Yosemite Valley, then for his groundbreaking motion studies that proved horses li...