Representation of the Microcosm – The Claim for Objectivity in 19th Century Scientific Microphotography

Abstract

Microphotography was one of the earliestapplications of photography in science: Thefirst monograph on tissue organizationillustrated with microphotographs was publishedin 1845. In the 1860s, a large number ofintroductions to scientific microphotographywere published by anatomists. They argued thatmicrophotography was a means of documenting theresults of microscopic analysis, uncontaminatedby the subjectivity of the observer. In theearly decades of the 19th century, beforethe general acceptance of cell theory, such atechnique was of special importance, as nocriteria were available to distinguish betweenimportant and superficial characters in thedescription of tissue microstructures.Microphotography was praised as the method ofchoice for documenting the scientificobservations of microscopic material. Some ofthe microphotographic practices described inthese early manuals, however, did not conformwith the idea of a purely mechanical process ofdocumentation. The authors of these manuals sawphotography not as a technique which producedartifacts, but as a complete and reliablesubstitute for the original preparations. Thus,according to these authors, the artificialworld of photography was seen as the actualrepresentation of the microworld. Consequently,they tried to understand the microcosm byanalyzing photographs instead of themicroscopic preparation themselves. Suchattitudes discredited the use ofmicrophotography in the sciences. Consequently,the definitive breakthrough of scientificmicrophotography was delayed until the 1880sand was largely due to the efforts of RobertKoch, who made microphotography a central toolof bacteriology.