
Untitled (Two Men Wearing Top Hats, Leaning on a White Picket Fence)
1853 · Daguerreotype
11 × 14 cm (4 1/4 × 5 1/2 in.)
Art Institute of Chicago

William J. Shew was an American daguerreotypist active in the mid-nineteenth century during the formative years of photographic practice. He worked primarily in daguerreotype and later photographic processes, establishing himself as a practitioner during photography's earliest technical innovations. Operating between 1820 and 1903, Shew contributed to the development of portraiture in America's first generation of photographers.
Source: Moma Bulk 2026 05 04 · Trust score: 92% · Updated 25d ago