A rare cabinet card by Julia Margaret Cameron.

The image portrays favorite sitters Mary Ryan and Kate Keown as part of a minstrel group. It is illustrated, more and less cropped, in Julia Margaret Cameron The Complete Photographs, by Cox and Ford, cat. nos. 1099 and 1100. This specific presentation is not documented. Two other compositions, presumably from the same sitting, are recorded (Cox & Ford nos. 1101 and 1102).

The cabinet card displays Julia's familiar "From life Copyright Julia Margaret Cameron" annotation, originally in her hand but here as typical printed onto the card. The gold border of the card is also typical of her reduced-size work.

NO RESERVE

The print is quite blotchy, as we often see on Julia Margaret Cameron's reduced size prints.