People from the Visual Past

The people archive gathers standalone features devoted to faces, performers, showmen, galleries, and unusual communities preserved in older photographs and illustrated records. These pages sit alongside the main Illustrated Past article collection and preserve a more gallery-like style of visual history: short introductions, striking portraits, and image-led stories about how people presented themselves to the camera and to the public.

Start with the selections below, from Landes stilt walkers and Buffalo Bill’s Paris performances to changing ideas of studio beauty in older portrait galleries.