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This ghostly seaweed on a blue background comes from the first book to be illustrated entirely with photographs. While the image represented a new era in publishing, its creator, Anna Atkins, wasn’t aiming to be an innovator: She just wanted to document the algae that fascinated her.
Learn more about Atkins (https://www.nhm.ac.uk/discover/anna-atkins-cyanotypes-the-first-book-of-photographs.html) and explore her first foray into the art form in a digitized version of the book (https://digitalcollections.nypl.org/collections/photographs-of-british-algae-cyanotype-impressions).
