The Toxic Book of Faces

Before the invention of photography, only the rich could afford to have portraits of themselves. But in the early 1800s, a device called the physiognotrace democratized portraiture, making it possible or everyday people to have their images captured in silhouettes. A man named William Bache traveled the United States creating hundreds of silhouette portraits with the aid of the physiognotrace, leaving behind a ledger book that gives us a rare glimpse of early America. A ledger book…laced with poison. Guests Robyn Asleson, curator of prints and drawings at the Smithsonian’s National Portrait Gallery Nora Lockshin, senior conservator for archives at the Smithsonian Libraries and Archives Wendy Bellion, Sewell C. Biggs Chair in American Art History, and associate dean for the humanities at the University of Delaware Carolyn Hauk, doctoral student in the art history department of the University of Delaware, former intern at the Smithsonian’s National Portrait Gallery