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Why not enrich your life with a fine vintage photograph?

Christopher Wahren has been dealing in vintage photographs for over twenty years. But it doesn't seem that long! As they say, time flies when you're having fun. From an initial entrée into early photography through the daguerreotype, his interests have broadened into other facets of the photographic experience including enthnography and the early photography of science. His personal collection focuses on early photography as a form of colonialism and exploration, the first opening of the photographic eye upon distant perspectives and unseen places.

As a dealer, Wahren finds a particular point of pride in the 19th-century and cased images which he is able to offer, with an emphasis on unique or rare content and outstanding image quality. Over the past years he has had the pleasure of placing large numbers of cased images in private collections as well as in major institutions. Although it is a mixed gratification, seeing former images in exhibitions or reproduced in print gives some compensation for no longer being their owner. And dealing with objects of true significance is always a pleasure. Indeed, it is an honor.

Through Christopher Wahren Fine Photographs, collectors have the benefit of his sources for unique and carefully chosen images, acquired with the same eye that has guided Wahren's own collection. Images receive the careful and knowledgable handling that comes from experience, coupled with a deep respect for these historic objects, part of our common cultural heritage.

What is the attraction of an antique photograph? Among other qualities, these images represent to us a past which often survives in no other form so vividly. Photographs were produced via a "mechanical" process that went above and beyond the immediate intentions of those who created them. In a way not possible for prints, paintings, or drawings, photographs often represent elements of the past which were entirely unnoticed at the time of production, or perhaps thought unworthy of recording. And yet to us long afterwards, these elements of reality are part of the photograph's message and its fascination. To resuscitate a hackneyed phrase, photographs truly "capture the past," containing as they do a breath of actuality not found in other media.

Originally produced in profusion, photographs were strongly subject to the processes of time. Those we encounter today are the survivors. As survivors they have outlasted many generations before our own, and they will outlast even us, their temporary owners. Indeed, in what sense can we be said to "own" something that will survive longer than we do? Say rather, it is our privilege to enjoy these artifacts, while we can. To experience the eras, the attitudes, and the personalities they bring to life, perhaps thereby bringing something unforeseen or beautiful into our own lives, seeing through the eyes of those who have gone before.

Copyright 2008 by Christopher Wahren