The first annual St Andrews Photography Festival, which is set to celebrate the role and legacy of the town’s pioneers of photography from August 1, has revealed details of its headlining exhibitions and events.

UPDATED: The full programme can be downloaded here (PDF).

BID St Andrews – the business improvement body created in January to support businesses in the town – has been working with the University of St Andrews and local businesses to create the new annual festival of photography to celebrate the role and importance of the town in the origins of the art and showcase the Scottish photography which has become part of the legacy of the pioneers who were based in St Andrews.

Dr John Adamson is perhaps the most celebrated early amateur photographer as he taught his brother Robert Adamson, who went on to form the seminal documentary partnership with David Octavius Hill, as well as Thomas Rodger - who set up the first photographic studio in St Andrews while still on 16 or 17 years old in 1849. But many other names are to be celebrated for the role they played, including Sir Hugh Lyon Playfair, David Octavius Hill, Robert Adamson, Thomas Rodger and Sir David Brewster.

The first six-week-long festival – from August 1 to September 11 - will see events and exhibitions focus on the earliest days of photography in St Andrews as well as the pioneers’ legacy in Scottish documentary photography since.

The festival will put some of the photographic archive highlights of the University of St Andrews Library Special Collections on show, as well as creating a showcase for contemporary Scottish photography.

Thirteen local businesses, including cafés and restaurants, are hosting exhibitions alongside six more conventional venues. There will also be workshops to demonstrate a variety of early photographic processes including calotype and collodion, talks and events for photographers of all ages and levels.

The exhibition highlights include:

• Scotland Through The Lens: 175 years of documentary photography - prints from University of St Andrews Library’s Special Collections archive.
• Pioneer Thomas Rodger - prints from the University of St Andrews Library’s Special Collections archive will be on show in the first purpose-built photographic studio on St Mary’s Place, now the University Careers Centre.
• Photographic artist Calum Colvin RSA OBE - a selection from Colvin’s much-collected 'constructed photography' output over the last 30 years, including a stereoscopic portrait.
• Document Scotland - a collaboration between Scottish documentary collective Document Scotland and the University of St Andrews Special Collections will see a selection of images displayed outdoors along the railings of The Scores, which looks out to the West Sands and the Firth of Tay.
• David Peat - street photography by the award-winning Scottish documentary-maker, cinematographer and photographer. There will also be a talk on Peat’s work by David Bruce.
• Renowned rock photography of Harry Papadopoulos - 16 images from the collection at Street Level Photoworks which resulted in the major project What Presence: the Rock Photography of Harry Papadopoulos.
• Franki Raffles - a cross-section of the archive of the feminist social documentary photographer, and St Andrews alumna, whose powerful images for the Zero Tolerance campaign highlighted awareness of domestic and sexual abuse against women around the world.
• Alicia Bruce - prints from the controversial Menie: TRUMPED project by the award-winning documentary photographer and lecturer about the effect on the natural landscape and local residents of the creation of the Trump Resort in Aberdeenshire. She’s also hosting a presentation of her portfolio and giving a portraiture workshop.
• Landscape pioneer Robert Moyes Adam – Once Scotland’s foremost landscape photographer, his work is known from Scotsman calendars, The Scots Magazine and many books from the 1930s and ‘40s.

The extensive events programme includes:

• Early processes demonstrations – Demonstrations of three of the earliest photographic processes: the calotype, the lucotype and the photogenic drawing and well as cyanotype printing workshop.
• Outdoor Victorian Tintype Studio – Have Richard Cynan Jones take your photograph in a recreation of an outdoor Victorian Tintype Studio.
• ‘Become a Street Photographer’ youth workshop - local photographer Carolyn Scott will give 13-17 year-olds tips on becoming a better storyteller with their photos. The resulting pictures will become part of the Scotland Through The Lens exhibition at the Gateway Galleries.
• Literary Readings inspired by the work of Hill & Adamson - Award-winning writer and St Andrews graduate Ali Bacon creates stories around the calotypes of Hill and Adamson and lends a voice to those who sat for the earliest portraits. Presented with the illustrations from the University Library Special Collections which inspired them.
• Family History Collections Day - An event for local families to bring their photos and have Rachel Nordstrom, Photographic Collections Manager at the University Library, explain their technical background, historical importance and discuss the proper long-term care of personal collections.
• The St Andrews Photo Tour - In the 1840s St Andrews became the first town to be thoroughly documented by photography. Walkers will learn about the people and places featured in Scotland Through the Lens: 175 years of documentary photography on a free walk led by the University Library’s Photographic Collection Manager, Rachel Nordstrom.

There will also be a series of talks by notable photo historians including: Dr A.D. Morrison-Low, Research Associate, National Museums Scotland, on the work of Dr John Adamson; Dr Sara Stevenson, former Chief Curator of the Scottish National Photography Collection; Professor Elizabeth Edwards of De Montfort University and David Bruce former director of the Scottish Film Council.

For sweet-toothed fans of historic photography, local Royal Warrant-holding bakers and confectioners Fisher & Donaldson are creating 'cartes-de-biscuite' – chocolate versions of the Cartes-de-visite photographic calling cards used by Victorian society – as well as chocolate ‘stereo-bars’ - bars of chocolate with images of St Andrews and can be viewed in 3D.

BID St Andrews Chair, Alistair Lang, says: “This festival is about celebrating the gift St Andrews’ photographic pioneers gave to the world and acknowledging the Scottish photography since their day which has become part of their legacy through being inspired by their work.

“We want everyone to be a part of this unique festival which will become a regular fixture in the town’s calendar, whether in person or via social media and the Web.

“The festival will provide an opportunity for businesses across the town to get involved and interact with customers in new ways.

“We gratefully acknowledge and thank the University and Fife Council for their support in creating this event.”

Festival Organiser Rachel Nordstrom (Photographic Collections Manager, University of St Andrews Library, Special Collections Division) says: “Thanks to a close friendship between William Henry Fox Talbot, the inventor of the photographic negative, and Sir David Brewster, Principal of the United Colleges in St Andrews, photography first arrived in Scotland by way of St Andrews. The new medium was then taken up with great enthusiasm across the country.

“While most people think of St Andrews as the home of golf, or the home of an ancient university, there is a rich photographic history which is often overlooked by many visitors. Our aim is to expand on what St Andrews has to offer for both visitors and locals.

“Over the past three years we have seen a resurgence in Scotland for the appreciation for historic and contemporary photography. Our aim is to build on this but highlight the vital role St Andrews played in the earliest days of photography, and the role Scotland played for the following 175 years.

“I am extremely excited to be involved in this joint project between the town and the University which highlights an important part of local heritage and celebrates a long line of talented Scottish photographers.”

The St Andrews Photography Festival will run from 1 August to 11 September 2016.

For latest details as they’re revealed, go to the Festival Facebook page at www.facebook.com/StAndPhotoFest/

Festival Headliners

Calum Colvin RSA OBE

Born in Glasgow in 1961, Calum Colvin is a practitioner of painting, sculpture and photography who graduated from the Royal College of Art with an MA in Photography in 1985. He brings these disciplines together in his unique style of 'constructed photography'- assembling tableaux of objects which are then painted and photographed.

His work has been exhibited worldwide for the last 30 years and can be found in major collections including the Metropolitan Museum of Modern Art, The Tate Gallery and the Gallery of Modern Art in Glasgow. A winner of one of the first Creative Scotland Awards in 2000, he was awarded an OBE the same year and is Professor of Fine Art Photography and Programme Director at Duncan of Jordanstone College of Art and Design, University of Dundee.

Exhibition venue – The Adamson Cocktail Bar

Talk and Artist Evening – August 3, 5.30pm at The Adamson - Calum Colvin will talk through his working processes for the items on display at The Adamson.

Information - www.calumcolvin.com

Document Scotland

Formed in 2012, Document Scotland is a collective of Scottish documentary photographers - Colin McPherson, Jeremy Sutton-Hibbert, Sophie Gerrard and Stephen McLaren - brought together by a common vision to witness and photograph the important and diverse stories within Scotland in the lead up to the Scottish Independence Referendum, one of the most important times in the nation’s history.

Exhibition venue – Railings along The Scores

Information - www.documentscotland.com

David Peat

David Peat (1947-2012) was an award-winning Scottish documentary-maker, cinematographer and photographer. The roots of his photography lie in the classic street photography genre. Continually inspired by the masters of this art and their skill at seeing and hunting a meaningful image within a moment in time. Special Collections Division of St. Andrews University Library acquired the David Peat Archive in 2014.

Exhibition venue – Cafe in the Square.

Talk – September 10, 5.30pm at The Byre Theatre - The Street Wise Photography of David Peat by David Bruce FRPS, a former Director of the Edinburgh International Film Festival and the Scottish Film Council.

Information - http://www.davidpeatphotography.com

Harry Papadopoulos

Harry Papadopoulos, born in 1954 in Helensburgh, is a self-taught Press photographer whose interest was inspired by taking photographs at gigs in the late 1970s. His images from 1979-1984, when he was a staff photographer for the legendary music weekly Sounds, capture the post-punk era when Scotland was at the epicentre of the independent music boom. His archive sits at Street Level Photoworks in Glasgow.

Exhibition venue – The Vic

Information - http://www.streetlevelphotoworks.org/event/whatpresence

Franki Raffles

Born in Manchester and raised in London, after graduating from St Andrews University with an MA in Moral Philosophy in 1977 Franki Raffles made her home in Scotland, first on the Isle of Lewis and later in Edinburgh, where she quickly established herself as a leading feminist social documentary photographer. Franki’s powerful images for the Edinburgh District Council Zero Tolerance campaign, which began in 1992 and highlighted awareness of domestic and sexual abuse against women, were subsequently used throughout Scotland, the UK and internationally as the campaign gained adoption further afield.

Exhibition venue – Old Union Coffee Shop

Information - http://www.st-andrews.ac.uk/imu/imu.php?request=display&port=45177&id=66e4&flag=start&offset=0&count=10&listcount=20&view=list&irn=555035&departmentfilter=Special%20Collections&ecatalogue=on

Alicia Bruce

Alicia Bruce studied Photography, Film and Imaging at Edinburgh Napier University, graduating in 2006. Her photographs have been presented internationally and won several artists’ residencies and bursaries. Many are represented in several public and private collections, including the National Galleries of Scotland photography collection.

Exhibition venue – Luvian’s Cafe

Portraiture Workshop - August 24, 10am at Eden Mill Tasting Room

Talk and Portfolio Presentation - September 7, 5.30pm at Martyrs Kirk - Menie: TRUMPED Project by Alicia Bruce

Information - http://www.aliciabruce.co.uk/projects/menietrumped/

Robert Moyes Adam

Pioneer Robert Moyes Adam (1885-1967) was Scotland’s foremost landscape photographer. His work is known from Scotsman Calendars, The Scots Magazine and many books from the 1930s and ‘40s.

Exhibition venue –The Doll’s House

Talk - August 9, 5.30pm, The Byre Theatre – Dr Pete Moore, who has researched Adam's work for years, will describe his life and work.

Information - http://www.st-andrews.ac.uk/imu/imu.php?request=browse&irn=1687

Scotland Through The Lens: 175 Years of Scottish Photography

50 prints from University of St Andrews Library’s Special Collections archive on display at Gateway Galleries, North Haugh tell the story of documentary photography from the earliest days up to present.

Exhibition venue – Gateway Galleries, Opens September 1.

Information - http://www.st-andrews.ac.uk/museum/exhibitions/future/

Thomas Rodger

Thomas Rodger (1833-1888) set up the first purpose-built photographic studio on St Mary’s Place in St Andrews in 1849 while still only 16 or 17 years old. Rodger was taught photography by Dr John Adamson.

Exhibition venue – University Careers Centre.

Information - http://www.st-andrews.ac.uk/imu/imu.php?request=browse&irn=1295

Events highlights

August 1, 5.30pm, Talk - Dr John Adamson: Photography in St Andrews before 1870, The Byre Theatre - Dr A.D. Morrison-Low, Research Associate, National Museums Scotland, will discuss the work of Dr John Adamson - one of St Andrews’s first photographers, whose work is perhaps not as well-known as it might be.

August 2, 10am, Early processes Demonstration, Pop-Up Darkroom – Contemporary calotype artist Rob Douglas will demonstrate three of the earliest photographic processes: the calotype, the lucotype and the photogenic drawing.

August 11, 5.30pm, Talk - Travels in Morocco with Hamish Brown, Martyrs Kirk – Dr Hamish Brown, Scottish mountaineer, photographer and writer has spent several months every year for more than five decades walking the Atlas Mountains in Morocco, photographing the landscape and people of the region.

August 20, 10am, Family History Collections Day, Martyrs Kirk - An event for local families to bring their photos and have Rachel Nordstrom, Photographic Collections Manager at the University Library, explain their technical background, historical importance and discuss the proper long-term care of personal collections.

August 25-27, 10.30am, Outdoor Victorian Tintype Studio, Pop-Up Darkroom – Have your photograph taken as people would have in the 1880s. Richard Cynan Jones will take your photo and demonstrate the collodion process in an Outdoor Victorian Tintype Studio.

September 3, 11am-4pm, ‘Become a Street Photographer’ youth workshop, Gateway Galleries, North Haugh - Do you want your photos to tell a story? Let local photographer Carolyn Scott give you tips to set on y becoming a better storyteller with your photos! Free Event is aimed at young people aged 13-17 years.

September 9, 5.30pm, In Sunshine and In Shadows - Literary Readings inspired by the work of Hill & Adamson, Martyrs Kirk - Award-winning writer and St Andrews graduate Ali Bacon creates stories from the calotypes of Hill and Adamson and lends a voice to those who sat for them. Presented with the illustrations from the University Special Collections which inspired them.

September 10, 5.30pm, Talk - The Street Wise Photography of David Peat, The Byre Theatre – David Bruce FRPS is a former director of the Scottish Film Council presents the social documentary photography of Davie Peat. 

The International Conference Stereo & Immersive Media 2016 aims to gather researchers, artists, curators, and archivists working on visual and sound media renowned for their immersive features.

“Stereo” environments (stereoscopic and stereophonic) have been widening the fields of photography and sound since the 19th century, contributing to the emergence of a progressively immersive media culture. This conference aims to bring together photography and sound research fieldsand their relationship with stereo environments, including other immersive visual media (e.g. panoramas, optical displays or virtual games) as well as sound art practices.

Confirmed Keynote Speakers:

Nicholas Wade, Emeritus Professor at Dundee University. Researcher in the history of vision, binocular and motion perception, and the interplay between visual science and art. His published books include:  Brewster and Wheatstone on Vision (1983) and Art and Illusionists (2016).

Larry J Schaaf, Director of the ‘William Henry Fox Talbot Catalogue Raisonné’, an online resource of the Bodleian Libraries, and Founder and Editor of the Correspondence of William Henry Fox Talbot Projecthe, he’s currently a Research Associate in the History of Art Department at Oxford. His published books include: Out of Shadows: Herschel, Talbot & the Invention of Photography(Yale, 1992) and The Photographic Art of William Henry Fox Talbot (Princeton, 2000).

Denis Pellerin, Curator of the London Stereoscopic Company. Co-authored books: La Photographie Stéréoscopique sous le Seconde Empire; Diableries. Stereoscopic Adventures in Hell and Crinoline: Fashion’s Most Magnificent Disaster.

We are inviting proposals for paper presentations, workshops/interactive sessions, posters/exhibits addressing one of the following themes:
1- Stereoscopic Photography (historical and contemporary);
2- Pre-cinema and Immersion;
3- Photographic and Sound Media Archaeology;
4- Panorama, Diorama and 360° Panoramic Photography;
5- Animation, Video games, Augmented and Virtual Reality;
6- Urban behaviour and the Influence of Sound devices;
7- Sonic Art and New Technologies;
8- Performance and Immersive environments;

Applicants will have the opportunity to submit their papers for publishing to the  International Journal on Stereo & Immersive Media.

This conference is convened by Universidade Lusófona de Humanidades e Tecnologias in collaboration with CICANT (Centre for Research in Applied Communication, Culture, and New Technologies).

Abstracts should have between 200-300 words for a 20 minutes presentation and should be submitted along with a short biography until 22 July on the website https://easychair.org/conferences/?conf=simedia2016 When filling the title field in easychair please indicate (within brackets) the number of the theme proposed in this call that best suits your presentation.

The official languages in the conference are English, Portuguese, and Spanish.

For further information please visit our website:
http://stereoimmersivemedia.ulusofona.pt or http://www.digitalmeetsculture.net/article/stereo-and-immersive-media-photography-and-sound-research-2016/

Other queries must be submitted to:
simedia2016@easychair.org

The 11th Seminar on the Origins and History of Cinema will have the theme of: Presences and Representations of Women in the Early Years of Cinema 1895-1920 and will take place in Girona, on Thursday 30th and Friday 31st of March, 2017. Details of the call for papers can be found here: Call for papers

Registration from 10 January 2017.

Beryl Diana Vosburgh, who for many years ran Jubilee Photographica, a shop selling old photographs and photographic equipment, in Pierrepoint Row, Camden Passage, London, died on 6 July 2016.

Beryl was a familiar face at the early auctions of photography and the name 'Jubilee' would be heard repeatedly in the days when a buyer's name was called out in the auction room and printed in the realised price sheets. She attended the first photography fairs and was a long-serving committee member of the Historical Group of the Royal Photographic Society which she joined in 1973. She was a founding member of both the Group and the Magic Lantern Society. Her shop was one of the first in Britain specifically devoted to historical photography and only closed in 2002. 

Beryl Roques was born in 1932 in Edmonton, north London. She attended RADA where she met Richard 'Dick' Vosburgh, the actor, writer, lyricist and broadcaster. They married in 1953 and remained together until his death in 2007 living in a beautiful town house in London's Islington. They had a son and five daughters.

While she was studying at RADA she was snapped up to be one of the main anchors of the 1952 BBC Radio series: The Younger Generation Under 20 Parade. It was described in the Radio Times as 'A programme on things to read, see, and hear, presented mainly by under-twenties'. She starred in this weekly series throughout 1952-53. Her resulting acting career highlights included: Miss Phillips in BBC Radio's Mrs Dale's Diary; Princess February in The Golden Cage for Children's Hour; the 1954 Home Service series entitled Home and Away with Dora Bryan and the BBC Revue Orchestra; alongside Phyllis Calvert in Monday Matinee presents Craig's Wife; 1961 film: A Little of What She Fancied and 1962's Associated Rediffusion TV series No Hiding Place.

In 1965 she became one of the regular presenters of the popular BBC children's programme Play School. She presented 35 episodes of the show alongside regulars Eric Thompson, Derek Griffiths, Johnny Ball and Brian Cant.

In 1977 her real-life actress daughter Tilly Vosburgh played her offspring in Secret Diaries for Yorkshire Television (her other daughter was played by Sophie Thompson). Also in 1977 she performed in a Jubilee theatre show at the Theatre Royal Drury Lane. Beryl supported Dick's successful career in television, radio, theatre, film and magazine, often assisting him on projects when he had plays on Broadway, on tour and in the West End and looking after the children when Dick was heavily involved in a project.

She played various roles in the demo tapes for her husband's musicals: Windy City, A Day in Hollywood A Night in the Ukraine and A Saint She Ain't to name a few. Beryl appeared in Jango (1961).  Away from her acting and shop, she was a professional photographer, photographing theatrical productions and taking the Spotlight pictures of countless high-profile actors and actresses.

Michael Pritchard writes...As a boy in the 1980s I got to know Beryl through the RPS Historical Group. I remember visiting her shop, taking care to visit on a Wednesday or Saturday, when it was open. Beryl's shop included plenty of cartes de visite, stereocards, albums, stereoscopes, lantern slides, cameras and the more accessible end of the market. She had a particular interest in photographic jewellery. When one visited she was more likely than not to press a photograph in to your hand as a gift irrespective of whether you bought something. She regularly donated material to institutions or to individuals if she felt it was the right home for it. Beryl was kindly, knowledgeable and wonderful company over dinner at her College Cross house. 

Images: courtesy The RPS, The Photographic Journal, February 1975. 

UPDATE: Amy Vosburgh has been in contact with details of Beryl's funeral which will take place on 18 July at Golders Green Crematorium. Anyone wishing to attend is asked to contact her on 07866 718030.

UPDATE 2. Thank you to Amy for additional information about Beryl's film and television career. 

The History and Archives section of the German Photographic Society (Deutsche Gesellschaft für Photographie, DGPh) has recognised scientific research in the history and theory of photography since 1978.

The DGPh History of Photography Research Award 2016 will be open for all elements of research into photography’s many aspects. Besides aspects of traditional history and theory of photography, topics will be considered that deal with photography’s social meaning, or the impact that the medium has had on society. The applicant's work should represent an autonomous, innovative, and original contribution to these areas. The award is open to researchers from all fields.

Applications and manuscripts for the DGPh History of Photography Research Award may be submitted in either English or German. Applications should consist of a published or unpublished manuscript produced during the last two years before the deadline. Project outlines, or yet unfinished manuscripts etc.will not
be accepted.

Allocation will be the decision of an expert jury. The jury will publish its reasons to reward the winning entry. The jury consists of the chairpersons of the History and Archives section of the DGPh, the previous prize winner plus one or a group of invited councillor(s).

The award is endowed with a total of 3,000 Euro. The jury holds the right to split the prize between two applicants in equal parts. The award will be handed over at a public event organized by the DGPh.

Submission requirements are the following pdf-files:

• A complete manuscript as electronic file form
• An abstract of the submitted work (approx. 300-500 words)
• A curriculum vitae (résumé)
• A list of publications.

The final date for submissions is the 30 September, 2016. Submissions should be send online under:
http://www.dgph.de/sektionen/geschichte_archive/ausschreibung-dgph-forschungspreis-fuer-photographiegeschichte-2016

More information about the German Photographic Society: www.dgph.de

This remarkable collection grew from Mike Simkin’s fascination with the pre-cinema moving image, with many fine rarities in every area: optical toys, magic lanterns, illuminants, books, catalogues and ephemera rounded off by the huge slide collection. Predominantly mahogany-mounted and hand-painted, it encompasses Isaac Knott Royal Polytechnic sets, Henry Langdon Childe chromatropes, dissolve sets, story sets and a multitude of mechanical slides, with many by Carpenter & Westley in all categories.

The Collection will be offered for auction in lots on 7 July 2016 by Special Auction Services. The printed and online catalogue is now available and can be seen online here: http://www.specialauctionservices.com/large/cm070716/index.html 

St Andrews Photography Festival has announced several events of interest to BPH readers. First up, on 1 August Dr Alison Morrison-Low will discuss the work of Dr John Adamson. View this and others at the Festival's Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/events/1733795436897095/

BBC Radio 4's In Our Time programme will look at the invention of photography on 7 July 2016. Melvyn Bragg and guests, Elizabeth Edwards, Alison Morrison-Low and Simon Schaffer, will discuss the development of photography in the 1830s, when techniques for 'drawing with light' evolved to the stage where, in 1839, both Daguerre and Fox Talbot made claims for its invention. These followed the development of the camera obscura, and experiments by such as Thomas Wedgwood and Nicéphore Niépce, and led to rapid changes in the 1840s as more people captured images with the Daguerreotype and calotype. These new techniques changed the aesthetics of the age and, before long, inspired claims that painting was now dead.

The programme will be available on the iPlayer shortly after broadcast. 

See: http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b07j699g

Special Auction Services of Newbury is to auction a group of material relating to Arthur E Morton FRPS, a pioneer of early colour photography, both still and moving. He was an exponent of Autochrome and Paget colour process and Kinemacolour.  

The full catalogue which also includes the exceptional Mike Simkin magic lantern and pre-cinema collection is available here: http://www.specialauctionservices.com/large/cm070716/index.html. The Morton material is lots 314-371. 

'Pictorialism' as a loosely constituted, international movement advocating photography’s assimilation into the traditional fine arts, succeeded to the extent that it fostered widespread acceptance of the medium as 'art' prior to World War I, but failed in the post-War period as its aesthetic agenda was condemned as 'anti-modernist', agrarian, bourgeois, and imitative of an outmoded, idealizing painting.

The purpose of this symposium, and the retrospective exhibition of the works of Clarence H. White that it accompanies, is to reconsider and complicate the stylistic goals, methods, influences, politics, and social networks of photographers who identified as 'pictorialists' and yet produced works that ranged from book and magazine illustrations, commercial portraits, fashion photos, to Salon prints, and from sharp-focus, silver bromides to multiple-gums. White’s own career serves as a model for the ways that aspiring art photographers responded to changing economic, political, and aesthetic conditions from the fin-de-siècle to the Roaring Twenties, thus straining the very definition of what “pictorialism” might mean.

Our friends at the William Henry Fox Talbot Catalogue Raisonné project have announced the news that Brian Liddy, formerly curator of collections access at the National Media Museum, Bradford, has been appointed the project's first research assistant.

BPH will bring news of former NMeM staff in due course. 

Read more about Brian's appointment here: http://foxtalbot.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/blog/ and why not sign up for the weekly blog alert at the same time?

Two jobs are being advertised by the National Media Museum, Bradford. Curator of Photography and Photographic Technology, to manage, develop, research, interpret and present the collections of the National Media Museum, To work with a wide range of different partners – academics, enthusiasts, communities – to foster knowledge of the collections and their scientific, technological and cultural significance, and to inspire audience understanding of and engagement with these collections;

and Collections Project Manager,The National Media Museum is planning to transfer the Royal Photographic Society Collection to the V&A.  This project will enable the V&A to invest in cataloguing and digitising the collection in order to provide greater public access. This role offers an opportunity to play a central role in ensuring the future one of the best photography collections in the country.  You will be responsible for planning and co-ordinating efficient and effective delivery of the work packages to time and budget, in close collaboration with colleagues at NMeM and the V&A. You will bring together specialist teams and contractors, and liaise closely to consider and advise on opportunities, impacts, logistics and dependencies.

For full details see: https://vacancies.nmsi.ac.uk/VacancyDetails.aspx?FromSearch=True&MenuID=6Dqy3cKIDOg=&VacancyID=1351 and https://vacancies.nmsi.ac.uk/VacancyDetails.aspx?FromSearch=True&MenuID=6Dqy3cKIDOg=&VacancyID=1350

Autograph APB is to present the first major exhibition of photographs by Raphael Albert (1935-2009), cultural promoter and photographer of black beauty pageants in west London from the late 1960s to the 1980s. The exhibition runs from 8 July-24 September 2016 and admission is free.

For more than three decades, Albert documented hundreds of popular dance, music and community events while building up a special portfolio of portraits of aspiring models. His long and successful career as a promoter and chronicler of beauty pageants included the establishment of Miss Black and Beautiful, Miss West Indies in Great Britain, and Miss Grenada. Albert, who came to England from Grenada in 1953, also founded his own magazine Charisma in 1984, and associated modelling school. In response to contemporaneous mainstream fashion and lifestyle platforms where black women were largely absent or at best marginal, these competitions celebrated the global ‘Black is Beautiful’ aesthetic of the 1970s in a local context.

Together with the obligatory bathing costumes and high heels, contestants often sported large Afro hairstyles, inventing and reinventing themselves on stage while articulating a particular black femininity as part of a widely contested cultural performance. These pageants offered the opportunity to create a distinct space for Afro-Caribbean self-articulation, a wager against invisibility, and importantly, a site to challenge conventional notions of beauty implicated in the social, cultural, and political contexts of the time.

The exhibition's curator, Renée Mussai says: "This historical archive offers a unique and fascinating collection of rarely seen photographs that document the ambivalent cultural performance of gendered and raced identities at a particular historical conjuncture. Imbued with an exquisite, revolutionary sensuality and a certain joie de vivre, Raphael Albert’s photographs embody an aura of hedonistic confidence in a new generation of black women coming of age in Britain during the 1970s, fuelled by complex (body) politics of national identity, difference and desire."

After Albert’s death in 2009, Autograph ABP began working with two of the photographer’s daughters, Vikkie Albert and Susan Ibuanokpe, to preserve his extensive collection of negatives and prints - a dedicated portfolio is now represented as part of the Autograph ABP Archive & Research Centre.

The exhibition will showcase over 50 modern exclusive black and white fibre prints, colour and vintage photographs, as well as a selection of archive materials and ephemera. Many of these photographs are now shown for the first time as a curated selection, carefully selected and produced from original negatives.

Raphael Albert Raphael Albert (1935-2009) was born on the Caribbean island of Grenada. After moving to London in the 1950s, he studied photography at Ealing Technical College whilst working part-time at Lyons cake factory. Albert then became a freelance photographer working for black British newspapers such as West Indian World – for whom one of his first assignments was documenting Miss Jamaica. He also took pictures for The Gleaner, Caribbean Times and New World. In 1970 he established the local contest Miss Black and Beautiful, followed in 1974 by Miss Teenager of the West Indies in Great Britain and Miss West Indies in Great Britain. He organised and photographed numerous pageants celebrating black British beauty throughout the 1970s, 80s, and 90s and eventually founded his own modelling school. He remained committed to capturing the Caribbean communities in his London area throughout his life, often taking home-studio portrait photographs for local families, and avidly documenting weddings, christenings, and other social events. In 2007 Albert presented a Black History Month display of his work entitled Miss West Indies in Great Britain: Celebrating 30 Years of Beauty Pageants (1963-1993) at the Hammersmith and Fulham Information Centre.

See more here: http://autograph-abp.co.uk/exhibitions/miss-black-and-beautiful

Image: Raphael Albert, Miss Black & Beautiful Sybil McLean with fellow contestants, Hammersmith Palais, London, 1972. From the portfolio 'Black Beauty Pageants'. Courtesy of © Raphael Albert/Autograph ABP

A petition, which will be presented to the mayor of Chalon-sur-Saône has been launched to support musée Nicéphore Niépce. Nearly 5000 people have already signed. The highly regarded museum has suffered 60 per cent budget cuts over the past two years and the petition asks the mayor of Chalon-sur-Saône to guarantee the financial resources necessary for the operation of the museum.

The public service mission and activities of the museum are being challenged by budgetary restrictions imposed by the municipality: including a nearly 60 per cent budget cut and an acquisition budget cut from €43,000 in 2015 to €14 000 in 2016. The cuts will have serious consequences on the collection, exhibitions and cultural mediation.

The collection was conceived and developed since 1974, and has nearly 3 million images, objects and books. It is one of the richest devoted to photography in France and Europe. The active acquisition policy, focusing on contemporary photography, provides institutional and international recognition to photographers.Temporary exhibitions support a highly regarded cultural public service mission and foster public discussion. 

See and sign the petition here.

See the museum's English website here to read more: http://en.museeniepce.com/

The advent of photography in 1839 catapulted Victorian society into a new age of science, art and leisure. Previously only the wealthy could possess a painted portrait, but photography was cheaper and democratised the privilege of owning a likeness. A variety of forms soon emerged including the carte-de-visite, the daguerreotype, albumen prints, family photograph albums and stereoscopes.

This exhibition explores some of the ways that early photography was enjoyed by a society that quickly become obsessed with the new technology. See how the industry boomed and the culture of celebrity was born.

Close Up & Personal: Victorians & Their Photographs is a new interactive exhibition of photography and photographic items from the Watts Gallery Collection, with loans from the London Stereoscopic Company. See images of Victorian celebrities, and discover the rise of photography as art through the images of Julia Margaret Cameron and Henry Holiday. Interact with stereoscopic viewers (the first 3D photographic technique), and take a Victorian-style selfie.

Events

24 June: Watts at Dusk: Camera Obscura

16 July: Watts Academy Workshop: Pinhole Cameras

25 July: Study Day: Victorian Stereoscopes with Denis Pellerin

29 July: Watts at Dusk: Light & Shadow

4, 11, 18, 25 August: Free Family Drop-in: Photography Studio

19 August: One Day Workshop: Photography

25 August: Curator Breakfast Tour

12, 19, 26 Sept, 3, 10 October: Five Week History of Art & Design Course: Photography in the Victorian Age with Colin Ford CBE Hon FRPS, Bronwen Colquhoun, Denis Pellerin, Rhian Addison and Hilary Underwood

12 October: Evening Talk: The Dawn of Photography - From the Camera Obscura to the Kodak Brownie with Rob Dickins

See more at: http://www.wattsgallery.org.uk/en-gb/whats-on/close-personal-victorians-their-photographs/

Watts Gallery Artists' Village, Down Lane, Compton, Guildford, Surrey, GU3 1DQ

The Moscow Multimedia Art Museum has announced the launch of a new portal, History of Russia in Photographs, which exhibits around 80,000 photos dating from 1860 to 2000. The museum's director, Olga Sviblovo, said the portal's goal was to unite all museum and private photo collections in order to create a 'visual Wikipedia on Russian history in photos.'

Sliders allow a user to select and see photographs from a particular period or images can be search by name or keyword. 'We're now developing the site's English version and perfecting the auto translator because searching on the site is done through tags'. explained Sviblova.  Google's auto translate facility provides a workable site, although tags are in Cyrillic at the moment. 

The project brings together photographic material from all of Moscow's museums and the state archive, as well as with regional museums and the heirs of well-known Russian photographers. Users can also post their own photos, enhance the images and act as curators by creating their own exhibitions with accompanying texts and comments. 

See: https://russiainphoto.ru/

Image: Stallion Lyudmil, c.1860-1870s. From the collection of the Grand Duke Nicholas. Source: MAMM / MDF.

While St Andrews is world-renowned as the home of golf, BPH readers will know the important role the town has played nationally and internationally in photography from the 1840s to today. A new photography festival, which launches in August, will celebrate the role and importance of St Andrews in the world of photography and engage with those who live, work in and visit the town.

BID Chairman, Alistair Lang, explains: “We are one of the most photographed and filmed towns in the world, yet few realise much of the technology we enjoy the benefits of today began with the work of a collection of photographic pioneers who lived and worked in St Andrews in the 1800s.”

Dr John Adamson is perhaps the most celebrated – a blue plaque adorns the wall of his former home in the town on South St, now The Adamson Restaurant. But many other names are to be celebrated for the role they played, including Sir Hugh Lyon Playfair, David Octavius Hill, Robert Adamson, Thomas Rodger and Sir David Brewster.

The first six-week-long festival – from August 1 to 11 September - will see events and exhibitions focus on the earliest days of photography in St Andrews as well as Scottish documentary photography over the last 175 years and contemporary photography.

The festival will put some of the photographic highlights of the University of St Andrews Library Special Collections on show as well as creating a showcase for contemporary Scottish photography. 

Up to 15 local businesses will be involved, including cafés and restaurants, hosting small-scale exhibitions. There will also be tours, seminars, workshops and talks including guest photographers as well as workshops to demonstrate a variety of photographic processes including calotype and collodion - two of the earliest and those used by the town’s renowned pioneers of the art.

The exhibitions will include:

• 175 Years of Scottish Photography
• A 40th Anniversary retrospective of Edinburgh’s Stills Gallery
• Pioneers Thomas Rodger - who set up the first purpose-built photographic studio in St Andrews in 1849 - and Robert Moyes Adam
• Renowned Press photographers George M. Cowie and Harry Papadopoulos
• Documentary photographers Franki Raffles, David Peat, Dr Hamish Brown MBE, Sean Dooley and Document Scotland (Colin McPherson, Jeremy Sutton-Hibbert, Sophie Gerrard and Stephen McLaren)
• Photographic artists Calum Colvin RSA OBE, Kit Martin and Keny Drew

There will also be a number of events, including a ‘Become a Street Photographer’ youth workshop, a Victorian Tintype Studio, a photographic tour of St Andrews and talks by photographers including Hamish Brown on his travels in Morocco. 

Alistair adds: “Today’s technology ensures we can all be photographers and we’re inviting everyone to be a part of this unique festival which we hope will become a regular fixture in the town’s calendar.”

“This event is about participation – engaging with people who live and work in the town as well as those visiting during the festival. We’ll also be using the event to reach out to those who like, follow and otherwise engage with us on digital and social media channels worldwide…using photographs.”

“The festival includes indoor and outdoor venues – making use of the town’s stunning setting and landscape to showcase work and engage with photographers of all ages. It will also provide an opportunity for businesses across the town to get involved and interact with customers in new ways.”

The St Andrews Photography Festival will run from 1 August to 11 September 2016.

For details as they’re revealed, go to the Festival Facebook page at www.facebook.com/StAndPhotoFest/

On 30 June there is a party to celebrate Studies in Photography the journal of the Scottish Society for the History of Photography SSHoP) at the Scottosh National Portrait Gallery, Edinburgh. From the relaunch of the journal will appear as a twice yearly publication with this Anniversary Edition that takes as its inspiration the 1996 edition which featured the work of several photographers who exhibited in the seminal exhibition Light From the Dark Room at the National Galleries of Scotland in 1995.

International Photography Curator at the Scottish National Portrait Gallery, Anne Lyden, will welcome guests followed by distinguished photographic artist Alexander Hamilton, Chair of SSHoP (Scottish Society for the History of Photography), who will introduce us to the work of the society and its journal, which is now for the first time available to the general public.

Edinburgh based photographic artist and co-editor of SSHoP’s biannual publication, Robin Gillanders, will announce forthcoming events and lectures.

Members of SSHoP committee will be present along with a number of renowned photographers featured in the journal to meet attendees, sign books and discuss their work, including Patricia Macdonald, Catriona Grant, David Williams, Calum Colvin, Owen Logan, Ron O’Donnell, Ian Stewart and Thomas Joshua Cooper.

Enjoy an evening of live jazz, drinks and receive a 15% off* purchases made on the night, including Studies in Photography and publications by key photographers from the Society.

The SNPG Gallery will be open for viewing during the event until 7pm.

See more here: https://www.nationalgalleries.org/whatson/events-calendar/scottish-society-for-the-history-of-photography-journal-launch-party/date/2016-06-09/interval/0/

Two more titles have appeared in the RAI Anthropology and Photography on-line pamphlet series. Catherine de Lorenzo and Juno Gemes, From Resistance Towards Invisibility and Shireen Walton, Photographic Truth in Motion: The Case of Iranian Photoblogs. 

Both are available without charge to download at: https://www.therai.org.uk/publications/anthropology-and-photography

At the turn of the twentieth century, Robert Demachy (1859-1936) was one of the most famous photographers in the world. As the leader of the French school of pictorial photography, he fought tirelessly for the recognition of photography as a means of artistic creation. Demachy remains particularly important for his masterly use of pigment processes which enabled pictorial photographers to deeply modify the print for the sake of 'interpretation', then considered as the ultimate way to give a photograph its artistic value.

Robert Demachy’s work is far from being limited to these very impressive achievements.This exhibition gathers a hundred photographs, most hitherto unseen which show the breadth of his photography. 

Normandy was a haven, as much as a source of inspiration, for Demachy, an aesthete who, although belonging to the Parisian upper class, dreamt of a simple life in the country. He was very fond of the Côte Fleurie where he spent each summer and which became the setting of many of his landscapes, portraits and snapshots.

The exhibition Robert Demachy. Impressions de Normandie was conceived as a journey. A journey through the Calvados region for one, but more importantly a journey into the creation of a photographic work from the creation of the negative to the public exhibition of a personal interpretation of the initial subject. Eighty years after his death in a small country house on the heights of Hennequeville (near Trouville), the Musée Villa Montebello has decided to pay tribute to Robert Demachy, a true artist and lover of Normandy who had elected, as a means of expression, not the brush, the pencil or the chisel, but the camera.

Curated by Julien Faure-Conorton, this exhibition is part of the 'Normandie Impressionniste' Festival. A catalogue (in French) is published in conjunction with the exhibition (Cahiers du Temps Editions, 120 pages).

See more here: http://www.cahiersdutemps.fr/robert-demachy-impressions-de-normandie-f218028.html

Robert Demachy. Impressions de Normandie. Photographies du Calvados 1880-1920
June 18, 2016 – September 25, 2016
Open: Wednesday to Sunday – 10am to noon and 2pm to 5.30pm

Musée Villa Montebello
64, rue Général Leclerc - Trouville-sur-Mer, France
www.museevillamontebello.com

Image: Robert Demachy, Trouville Harbour, 1911-1914, oil transfer print, private collection.