Camille Silvy: Photographer of Modern Life (1834-1910)
National Portrait Gallery, London WC2

Was Camille Silvy, the French 19th-century portrait photographer, the Andy Warhol of his day? Comparisons have been made. Unlike the American pop artist, however, Silvy's star dimmed rather abruptly - as soon as he stopped working, in fact, which he did after ten intense years. The National Portrait Gallery's major survey, featuring just over 100 prints, is Silvy's first ever retrospective. Most of these photographs have not been seen since they were taken, about 140 years ago. What's more, the NPG owns 12 hefty volumes of Silvy's daybooks, containing every commercial sitting he undertook at his industrious studio in Bayswater, west London. So, why the neglect?

In part, it was because the work of second- wave photographers such as Silvy - the groundbreaking figures Louis Daguerre and William Fox Talbot belong to the first wave - were never going to make as lasting an impact. Photography was, after all, a medium that advanced with rapid pace in this period. In his day, however, Silvy's name was known in the most esteemed circles: from Queen Victoria - Prince Albert sat on a number of occasions, as did the queen's children and black god-daughter Sarah Bonetta (daughter of a captured Nigerian chief) - to the fashionable young actresses who posed for him in their crinolines.

At C Silvy and Co, his production-line practices resembled more of a factory than a conventional studio. He employed 40 assistants and produced 70,000 portraits in just nine years. Many of these were cartes de visite (or calling cards - the social networking of the day), for which Silvy fostered a craze. This meant that, at the height of his success, he must have been handling one sitting every 12 minutes. Given we're not talking the speed of a 21st-century photo booth, this shows impressive productivity.

But a photo-booth multiple print - or, indeed, Warhol's repeated images - is exactly what we think of when we look at Silvy's repeated images on single sheets. By working on multiple negatives, he produced rows of the same image. He also dabbled in the "postage stamp" portrait. The head of one Alexandre Monnier, for example, is framed in a series of "stamps", each identically inscribed "C Silvy" and "London". Underneath each stamp we find Monnier's tightly clasped hands; disembodied, they form a kind of two-tier decorative motif. Two rows of 14 images; two different poses. The effect is rather comical, given Monnier's dour look.

Silvy was also fond of the artful use of a mirror. His photograph of two sisters by the name of Booth presents one looking at the camera and the other with her face turned away, shadily reflected in the Venetian mirror behind her. The triangular composition shows how carefully Silvy worked to position his sitters. Still, they manage to look natural and relaxed - a testament to his ability to put people at their ease.

Silvy manipulated images from the start. River Scene, France (1858) - the photograph that made his name - is far from the natural idyll it appears. It is a composite of two negatives, on one of which he painted the clouds and trees. It has been cropped, tonally altered and shaded. London presented the foggy vistas of Charles Dickens and Wilkie Collins. Here, atmospheric street scenes - depicting itinerant musicians, Indian street cleaners and newspaper boys - show an obsession with the effects of light to rival that of any later impressionist. One, Twilight (1859), from another series of composite images, uses the technique of blurring for the first time.

Silvy worked at a frenetic pace, but his burst of creativity lasted barely a decade, from 1857 to 1867. He had been a diplomat in France before giving it all up to become a photographer. Just as suddenly, he had come to London and with notable speed established a hugely successful commercial practice. And then, at the height of his fame, he gave that up, too.

At 35 he returned home and fought in the Franco-Prussian war, winning commendations for bravery. He was eventually diagnosed with la folie raisonnante (bipolar disorder) and his last 30 years were spent in asylums. But, during that one decade of activity, Silvy more than lived up to Baudelaire's dictum of depicting modern life - high life and street life - with vividness and passion.

“Camille Silvy" runs until 24 October. For more details visit: npg.org.uk