Pinzgau Bull, Aged 30 Months, Raised by M. Johann Buchner, at Caprun-ober-Pinzgau. 1st Prize in the Races of Pinzgau and Montafon (Taureau de Pinzgau, Agé de 30 mois, élévé par M. Johann Buchner, à Caprun-ober-Pinzgau. 1r. Prix des races de Pinzgau et de Montafon)

While his older brother Nadar (Gaspard-Félix Tournachon) gained renown as a portrait photographer, Adrien Alban Tournachon made a series of “portraits” of livestock. This image was part of an album that featured around fifty prizewinning livestock that were photographed at the 1856 Paris Agricultural Exhibition. These staged portraits made use of the newly devised collodion emulsion, which allowed for much shorter exposure times. Even so, prospective animal photographers at this time faced a difficult task, and Tournachon’s bovine portraits were seen as technical triumphs despite the human figure keeping the animal still and the makeshift, draped backdrop. Later the same year, French naturalist Émile Baudement used Tournachon’s photographs as source images for printed illustrations in his atlas Les Races Bovines au Concours Universel Agricole de Paris en 1856 (Cow Breeds at the Paris Universal Agricultural Competition in 1856).