Lola Montez Denies Conventions in Her Image
Central to Lola’s self-promotion was the dissemination of her image, primarily in the form of daguerreotypes and lithographs after daguerreotypes. Newspaper reviews and caricatures of her act circulated internationally, and her several sittings for daguerreotypes gave her a moderate sense of agency in constructing her portrait to counter her portrayal as lascivious in popular media. In these she demonstrated her oscillation between daring free-thinking associated with the frontier past of California and her understanding that she needed a façade of respectability to be tolerated by the reformers and civilizing forces increasing in 1853.