With technological limitation, our first photographs are mainly seated posed images that somehow give the impression that everyone in the 1800s was elegant and composed. But, thanks to one clever Norwegian student, we have a hidden glimpse of life in the 1890s.Carl Størmer (1874-1957) was a young student of mathematics when he purchased his first hidden camera. It was so small that the lens fit through the buttonhole in his vest with a cord that led down to his pocket, allowing him to secretly snap away.
In his biography for the Fellows of the Royal Society, he revealed it was actually a secret crush that led him toward photography. “When he was a young man at Oslo University he fell in love with a lady whom he did not know and with whom he was too bashful to become acquainted,” writes his biographer. “Wishing at least to have a picture of her, he decided that this was possible only by taking a photograph of her himself, without her knowing.” more
