Sotheby's Postpones Sale of Early Photographic Work

NEW YORK—Sotheby's announced yesterday that it would postpone the sale of an early photographic print known as a photogenic drawing amid suspicions that the work may be the earliest existing photographic rendering, reports the New York Times. The image of a leaf has long been attributed to early photographer William Henry Fox Talbot, but Larry J. Schaaf, an expert on Talbot's work, questioned the attribution in the auction's catalog. He suggests that the image could have been created by early photographic experimenters Thomas Wedgwood, James Watt, or Humphry Davy, who are known to have produced photogenic drawings — in which an object is placed on photosensitive paper and exposed to light — as early as the 1790s, though none have ever been found. Sotheby's and the work's consignor, the investment firm the Quillan Company, have decided to postpone the sale until more research can be done.