[gerikson]

The issue of "originality" raised its head as soon as photography evolved beyond the daguerreotype (which could not be reproduced). As soon as you had a negative from which a print could be produced, you can theoretically produce infinite indistinguishable prints.

Photographs exist as art basically because the photographer or their agent promise to only produce a limited number of prints from an original.

[SAI_Peregrinus]

It's older than that, even woodcuts other printmaking processes have the same issue.