Eadweard Muybridge

Eadweard Muybridge (1830-1904) is one of the most influential artists in the history of photography. Best known for his pioneering work in photographic studies of motion, Muybridge began photographic experiments in the early 1870s, when he adopted the very latest technology of the time to demonstrate that during a particular moment in a galloping horse’s gait, all four legs were off the ground simultaneously. Muybridge affirmed this theory by using a galloping horse to trigger the shutters of a bank of cameras. Following this initial success, Muybridge expanded his methods to capture the human and animal figure engaged in over 700 different movements and actions, resulting in the images that make up Human and Animal Locomotion.