View images of Mathew Brady's salted paper prints.

Mathew Brady captured the likeness of political and business leaders, writers, artists, and actors using a large-format camera. He often positioned his sitters next to a chair, urn, or drapery. From a single sitting he could create a negative from which he could distribute multiple prints. Brady called these images “Brady Imperials,” a name that helped to affirm the status of local and national leaders of the new nation. While the albumen print was introduced in 1851, Brady continued to make salted paper prints for his Imperial portraits. The matte surface of the salted paper prints was especially suited to retouching or hand coloring. The Fine Arts Library holds over 200 Imperial portraits by Brady’s studio.