Rolfe took an interest in photography throughout his life, but never achieved any more than basic competence.
While he began to experiment with photography when he was a schoolmaster, it was his time in Rome in 1889–90 that introduced him to the work of the 'Arcadian' photographers Wilhelm von Gloeden and Guglielmo Plüschow.
His seminary, the Scots College, was quite close to Plüschow's studio in via Sardegna, just off the via Veneto, and when Rolfe was expelled from the College and came under the benevolent patronage of the Duchess Sforza Cesarini, he began his own photographic efforts in imitation of von Gloeden and Plüschow.
His models were the local ragazzi from the streets of Genzano di Roma, a town dominated by the Duchess's palazzo.
These youths were later to become the principal characters in Rolfe's Toto stories, published first in The Yellow Book in 1895–96 and later collected in Stories Toto Told Me in 1898 and In His Own Image in 1901.

Rolfe continued to indulge his interest in photography in Christchurch in 1890–91, upon his return from Rome, and experimented with colour and underwater pictures.
He began to lose interest, however, and really only took photography up again when he returned to Italy in 1908.
His photographic career has been fully documented in Donald Rosenthal's book The Photographs of Frederick Rolfe Baron Corvo 1860–1913, which was published in 2008.
Rolfe took an interest in photography throughout his life, but never achieved any more than basic competence. While he began to experiment with photography when he was a schoolmaster, it was his time in Rome in 1889–90 that introduced him to the work of the 'Arcadian' photographers Wilhelm von Gloeden and Guglielmo Plüschow. His seminary, the Scots College, was quite close to Plüschow's studio in via Sardegna, just off the via Veneto, and when Rolfe was expelled from the College and came under the benevolent patronage of the Duchess Sforza Cesarini, he began his own photographic efforts in imitation of von Gloeden and Plüschow. His models were the local ragazzi from the streets of Genzano di Roma, a town dominated by the Duchess's palazzo. These youths were later to become the principal characters in Rolfe's Toto stories, published first in The Yellow Book in 1895–96 and later collected in Stories Toto Told Me in 1898 and In His Own Image in 1901.
Rolfe continued to indulge his interest in photography in Christchurch in 1890–91, upon his return from Rome, and experimented with colour and underwater pictures. He began to lose interest, however, and really only took photography up again when he returned to Italy in 1908. His photographic career has been fully documented in Donald Rosenthal's book The Photographs of Frederick Rolfe Baron Corvo 1860–1913, which was published in 2008.
Frederick Rolfe