I didn't know about "Circasian Beauties" when I found this carte de visite photo by Charles Eisenmann, a well known New York Bowery district photographer of the 1880s, most (in)famous for his photographs of side show figures from the Barnum and Bailey circus, including "Siamese Twins" Chang and Eng, and "Jojo the Dog-faced Boy." I've since learned a bit about the long history of fascination with "Circassian" women, and P.T Barnum's invention and exhibition of his own brand of Circassian beauties-- the latter a distinctly late 19th century invention, but all emblematic of our longstanding and enduring fascination with, and simultaneous dehumanization of, the "exotic other." 

There is a lot here one could dig into, but very briefly, apparently, the concept of the "Circassian beauty" dates back to as early as the late Middle Ages, suggesting that women from northern part of the Caucasus region (between Europe and Asia) were unusually attractive, and thus highly desirable. This notion was advanced during the Italian Renaissance by Cosimo de Medici himself, who kept a Circassian slave (by whom he had an illegitimate child) and gained momentum following the horrific Russian genocide of the Circassian people in the 1860s--on the heels of which P.T Barnum determined to exhibit "Circasian beauties" as part of his sideshow.  Of course Barnum's beauties were complete inventions, a fictional stereotype characterized by pale complexions and "moss hair" and a convoluted narrative characterizing them both as chaste but also as former harem slaves. Lots of critical writing about this out there, here's a good essay in the Public Domain Review by Betsy Golden Kellem. 

So, a very problematic representation, clearly, but as with pretty much all of our visual culture, indicative not just of a specific point in history and its way of seeing, but also of persistent tendencies, power structures, and dynamics of representation. And this is to say nothing of Charles Eisenmann himself, and the world of his studio, and all that was swirling around the Bowery at that time... But then, back to this particular woman, self as well as subject, looking to me rather defiant, as if to say FU to it all. 

4 1/8 x 2 7/16. Good condition, with a bit of light edge wear.