It’s been called the first underwater photograph and the first underwater self-portrait, but it doesn’t seem to be either of those things. No, but this photo by diver and photography pioneer Louis Marie Auguste Boutan, taken in 1899, does seem to be the world’s first underwater portrait.
Accurate details about this photograph are difficult to pin down. Here’s what we know for sure: it is not a self-portrait. It is a portrait of... more