This June, Christie’s offers one of the most important collections of daguerreotypes to come to market in the past 25 years. Announced to the world in 1839 and born of a collaboration between Frenchmen Joseph Nicephore Niepce and Louis Mande Jacques Daguerre, the daguerreotype was the ‘first truly practical photographic system’. By their nature, daguerreotypes are unique objects; they immediately became an international sensation.

Beginning in the 1960s, Lynn and Yann Maillet pursued collecting daguerreotypes with a fierce passion. It was a period when stupendous pieces were being unearthed, and a wide range of works were readily available in what was then a relatively nascent collecting market. Well-known within the field and yet resolutely private, the Maillets amassed a collection with great depth and outstanding breadth. This collection of over 200 lots of daguerreotypes have never before been on public view.

This collection contains significant and rare works by Samuel Morse, Robert Cornelius, John Ruskin, Platt D. Babbitt, Henry Fitz Jr., Plumbe, Moreau, Durand, Eynard, Plumier, Francis Grice, Bogardus, Helsby, more than two dozen plates by Southworth & Hawes, and a wide variety of American and European views, occupational portraits, and views of the California gold rush.