Described by Roland Barthes as one of the great “originators” of photography, Julia Margaret Cameron was a creature like no other. She picked up her first camera in 1863, when she was 48. A gift from her daughter, the camera was delivered with a note that now reads like an award-winning example of British understatement: “It may amuse you, Mother, to try to photograph during your solitude at Freshwater.” In that seaside village, on England’s Isle of Wight, Cameron made almost 1,000 images—grave, romantic, experimental—that to this day look like no one else’s. The V&A touring show “Arresting Beauty: Julia Margaret Cameron” now comes to New York City. —Sarah Hyde