Why don’t people in old photos smile?

Modern people tend to smile or even grin when taking photos. In contrast, the characters in many old modern portrait photos have serious faces, and even look a little "mourning".

▍Empress Dowager Cixi, Prince Yikuang of Qing, Li Hongzhang, Queen Victoria of the United Kingdom, Bismarck, the "Iron Chancellor" of Germany, and President Grant of the United States. Whether in China or the West, almost all photos of modern figures have this serious or even slightly "mourning" style

▍Even weddings that should be joyful look like funerals in old photos< /p>

Many explanations for this phenomenon are that in the early days of photography, the exposure time of photos was long, and the people being photographed could not keep smiling for such a long time.

However, the "mourning photos" above were all taken in the late 19th century. At that time, the photography technology was mature enough and the exposure time had been reduced from the initial half hour to only a few seconds. It is not difficult to maintain a smile in such a short period of time.

Therefore, the length of photo exposure is not the main reason. The reason why the characters in old photos all look so "mourning" is mainly because early portrait photos were strongly influenced by portraiture.

This can be supported by Mark Twain's letter to the "Sacramento Daily Union": "Photographs are very important documents, and there is nothing better than passing down to future generations a picture that has been frozen forever. Smirking is even more damning.”

▍Mark Twain, who is known for his humor, also appears surprisingly serious in his portraits

That’s what Mark Twain thinks. The general attitude of society at that time: Although the cost of taking a photo is much cheaper than asking someone to draw a portrait of you, it is still a large expense for most people. It takes a long time for people to have the opportunity to take a photo. Some people even take only one photo in their entire life.

So if people are going to take pictures, in most cases it is for portraits. Early portraits tried their best to imitate portraits in various aspects, and naturally inherited the serious expressions of people in portraits.

At the same time, in order to prove that photography is an art and not a simple mechanical operation, photographers of that era also tried to produce the effect of classical paintings.

▍The picture on the left is a portrait of Lincoln, and the picture on the right is a portrait of George Washington. It can be seen that Lincoln's portraits not only imitate the movements of classical portraits in their serious expressions and standing postures, but also the objects in the background strive to be similar

The reason why people do not smile in classical portraits is also easy to explain. : In ancient times, even for princes and nobles, the portraits they drew in a lifetime might not be as many as the selfies some people take in a week today.

At the same time, the portrait itself is not a random record of a certain moment, but the overall image that a person wants to show to the world and future generations.

▍The oil portrait painted by Dutch painter Hubert Vos for Cixi when he was invited to visit China in 1905. In the painting, Cixi is terrifyingly serious

In addition, People who have the ability to own portraits often want their image to be solemn, solemn and noble. If it is a smiling portrait, it will make people think that the portrait owner is a willful, casual or even dissolute person.

▍The serious portrait of Pope Innocent X

As for the smiling face that appeared in the later photos, it has a lot to do with the popularity of cameras.

By the 20th century, photographic equipment gradually became cheap and easy to operate, personal cameras appeared and became popular, and taking pictures was no longer an expensive thing. People can take pictures anytime and anywhere. Just as a camera advertising slogan says, "You press the shutter and we do the rest." Taking pictures has become more convenient and cheaper.

Because we can have more photos, especially life photos, and with the rise of movies at this time, the world has learned that people can have normal movements and expressions on the screen, and the public's attitude towards photography has also changed. It started to become more casual and the smiles gradually increased when taking photos.

Many camera and film companies have also followed this trend and promoted it, showing more scenes of smiling faces when creating advertisements, further making people feel that smiling when taking pictures is a matter of course.

▍Screenshot of Kodak TV commercial

After World War II, a relaxed expression and a smile basically became the standard for taking photos. A study of student photos in U.S. high school yearbooks from 1905 to 2005 also found a trend that the number of times people smile when taking photos increases year by year.

▍The picture on the left is U.S. President Herbert Hoover before World War II, and the picture on the right is U.S. President Kennedy after World War II. We can clearly see the changes in the portraits of American presidents before and after World War II.

Even in photos at formal occasions or official portraits, modern royal nobles and senior officials do not always have a straight face like in the past. Instead, they often have relaxed expressions, smiles, and even Also smiles.

▍Left: King Felipe VI of Spain attending a diplomatic occasion; right: former US President Obama’s official portrait taken in the Oval Office of the White House