Tombeau de la chrétienne. Vue du côté nord. (Tomb of the Christian Woman. View of the North Side.)

About this artwork

Documenting archeological sites in Egypt and Algeria, John Beasly Greene produced fewer than 350 images in a mere four years (he died on his third trip to Egypt at the age of twenty-four). Greene’s twin pursuits of photography and archeology matched the larger 18th- and 19th-century penchant for memorializing lost civilizations through the wonders of modern technology. From the photographer Gustave Le Gray, Greene learned the newly perfected waxed-paper negative (a salted paper print technique),...