Question

Julia Margaret Cameron (1815—1879)
In the mid-Victorian age, Julia Margaret Cameron was regarded as a curiosity. Photography was in its
infancy and photographers were, with few exceptions, male and either frustrated painters or scientists
obsessed with the details of their new discipline. Julia was neither of these, and didn’t take what she
considered to be her first successful portrait until she was 48. 1. _______ She still holds the record for
the highest auction price paid for a single 19th-century British photograph (£147,000 in 2001).
Her own special style, full of light and shade and slightly out of focus, started, she modestly claimed,
as a ‘fluke’. As she explained: ‘When I was focusing one day, I came across something which, to my
eye, was very beautiful, so I stopped there instead of screwing on the lens to the more definite focus
which all the other photographers insist upon.’ The photographic establishment was quick to find fault.
2. _______ ‘As one of the special charms of photography consists in the completeness, detail and
finish, we can scarcely commend works in which the aim appears to have been to avoid these qualities’.
Cameron, however, persevered with her way of capturing images. She took portraits of many famous
people of her time and also liked to photograph people dressed to represent characters in myths and
other well-known stories. She convinced her family, neighbours, acquaintances and servants to take
roles as Greek gods and goddesses. She even press-ganged passers-by to join the group if they looked
right for a picture however unwilling they were. People touring the area would make a special trip to see
Cameron at work in her studio.
Cameron’s passion for photography arose out of her family circumstances. 3. ______ In 1838, she
married Charles Cameron, a prominent lawyer and administrator, twenty years her senior, and for nearly
a decade the Camerons lived overseas. In 1848, they moved back to England, but Charles travelled a
lot and, as her six children grew up and left home, Cameron combatted loneliness with photography.
Besides, she had never seen herself as a traditional home-keeper.
Cameron’s neighbour was the famous poet Tennyson and, at her own expense, she produced an
edition of his book of poems Idylls of the King, which she illustrated with her photos. The poems are
about the legendary King Arthur and his brave knights who fought to protect the weak and the innocent
and, in the accompanying photos, these characters have a heroic beauty. 4. _______ Cameron also
experimented with scenes from literature, turning her kindly, long-suffering husband into a heavilybearded King Lear, from the play by Shakespeare.
When the first Dictionary of National Biography was put together in the 1890s, Julia Margaret Cameron
was the only photographer in its pages, and one of only eighteen women in its 420 entries. That she
was featured at all has much to do with the fact that the editor, Leslie Stephen, was married to her
favourite niece. 5. ______ Among her family and in the art world, her work was held in high regard at
the time of her death in 1879. However, the photography world was less certain and almost a century
passed before it changed its mind.
A. Her father was a judge in the Indian Civil Service and she was born in Calcutta in 1815.
B. Servants and simple villagers played the king, his queen and the noblemen of the poems.
C. The Journal of the London Photographic Society expressed its disapproval.
D. Her surviving prints are now considered masterpieces of their age.
E. Nevertheless, she showed more talent than many of her male contemporaries.
F. But, despite his help, Cameron’s reputation didn’t immediately survive her.

Answer 1

Respuesta:

d

Explicación:

Answer 2

Respuesta:

1.- E

Explicación: