The Magazine Antiques

Posted 12/04/11

Struggles many and great: James P. Ball, Robert Duncanson, and other artists of color in antebellum Cinncinati

In 1854 Gleason's Pictorial, the popular, nationally circulated magazine out of Boston, published an article promoting the lavish "Daguerrian Gallery" es­tablished in Cincinnati by James P. Ball (Fig. 6), lauding his im­ages as "unsurpassed by any in the Union."1 In fact, Ball's Gallery (see Figs. 2, 4) was not so un­usual.<