Louis Daguerre: Scorpio Sun/Pisces Moon
Louis Daguerre was a Scorpio Sun, Pisces Moon, like today’s astrology. Fitting for the first post, since he’s one of the inventors of photography. He took this Daguerreotype in 1838 (or 1839—the year he announced photography to the world) of Boulevard du Temple. It looks like an empty street, but it wasn’t—there were ppl & traffic going past but the exposure was so long (~7 min) it only caught this person getting their shoes shined bc they were staying in one spot! This is the first photo of a person.
Being a Scorpio, Daguerre had some power-related drama when developing his Daguerreotype process. His early degree Pisces moon means he was emotionally tied to the beginnings of photography, which is ruled by Pisces/Neptune. (This is a noon chart so he could have a late Aries moon) The asteroids Daguerre (in Gemini) and Niépce (in Sag) are exactly opposite in his chart—Nicéphore Niépce was his partner in developing this process, through his work on the heliograph, and who he developed the physautotype with. There was some tension with Niépce’s son, who felt Daguerre was writing Niépce out of the history of photography. Without Niépce there would be no Daguerreotype, an opposition and balance seen here in Daguerre’s chart. This Daguerre asteroid is conjunct Jupiter in Gemini, which I see as ruling the mirroring of photography, the positive/negative aspect of other processes, and literally reflecting the light from the subject onto the polished mirror of a Daguerreotype.
That Venus, asteroids Photographica & Niépce, Mercury & North Node are in Sagittarius plus his Pisces moon= Daguerre’s ability to have things work out in his favor, like his Diorama burning down in Paris, his relationship with Niépce, announcing photography first even tho Talbot had been sitting on it. Also the ability to expand his mind into big possibilities—the prospect of capturing an image forever on a mirror, which is better viewed with some shadow, and alone. Experimenting in a darkroom is very Sag + Pisces.
