Could you work confidently with historical artefacts, catalogues and collections in a museum or gallery setting? We are looking for a motivated individual who has relevant experience to join our Corporate & Collections Information team as a Collections Information Officer. 

The National Media Museum cares for more than 3.5 million significant items, including the collections of National Photography, National Cinematography, National Television and National New Media.

You will be responsible for collections registration tasks to ensure that statutory responsibilities are maintained and delivered, regarding loan or disposal of objects held in the reserve collections. You’ll be based at the National Media Museum and will be working on collection loans out renewals, historic loans and object loans in renewals, as well as object acquisitions and disposals, GIS applications, collections rationalisation, and data cleaning for collections documentation.
Under direction, you will be able to take responsibility for delivering collections registration and collections documentation work, creating records to a good standard in the object database (MIMSY XG). You will work as part of the team to ensure that objects are fully documented and the Museum Group policies are adhered to. You will assist with drafting loan agreements and transfer of title paperwork, and managing the transportation of objects between the museum and borrowers, lenders or new owners. In addition, you will work with other departments within the museum, including those in the Curatorial, Corporate & Collections Information and Conservation & Collections Care teams.

We are looking for somebody who can effectively communicate and negotiate with current lenders and borrowers, balancing tact and diplomacy whilst adhering to our processes. Your attention to detail and ability to juggle a complex workload under time pressure will be second to none. Experience of working with the collections database Mimsy XG will be a distinct advantage. IT fluency is essential. 

You will be self-motivated and able to work effectively within a team, and you will be comfortable communicating with a range of people including colleagues at all levels and external stakeholders. You will be willing and able to take on a wide variety of tasks. Previous experience of collections registration or collections documentation, a working knowledge of the Government Indemnity Scheme and experience in the transportation of objects is essential. 

Salary: £16,500 - £17,500.00

Deadline: 14 February 2016

See more and apply here: https://vacancies.nmsi.ac.uk/VacancyDetails.aspx?FromSearch=True&MenuID=6Dqy3cKIDOg=&VacancyID=1245

Following the announcement that part of the National Photography Collection is to be transferred to the Victoria and Albert Museum in London, Impressions Gallery confirms that the Impressions Gallery Archive will be staying in Bradford. 

The archive, of over 3,000 artworks and objects, is a significant repository that demonstrates the cultural impact of photography and the vital role that Impressions Gallery has played in raising the profile of the medium in the UK. The Impressions Gallery Archive will continue to be conserved in Bradford alongside other prestigious collections of international significance including the Kodak Collection and the Daily Herald Archive.

Whilst Impressions Gallery is disappointed that the National Photography Collection will be divided between Bradford and London, the Gallery recognises that in the current funding climate, difficult decisions have had to be made to ensure the National Media Museum’s future.

Impressions Gallery Director Anne McNeill said: ‘It has always been important to us that our archive remains as a key resource for photography research in the North of England. The decision to move part of the National Photography Collection to the V&A is just another example of national resources being taken from the regions and going to the capital. We will be sad to lose our valued colleagues and friends in any restructure, and will continue to support the Museum in Bradford’.

Roger Watson, curator of the Fox Talbot Museum, is lecturing in the United States and can be seen in a livestream of his lecture on 4 February 2016 at 12.00AM GMT.

AAHD alumnus Roger Watson, BFA 1982, is a curator at Lacock Abbey, Fox Talbot Museum, in Lacock, England, Britain's birthplace of photography. Watson's recent book is Capturing the Light: The Birth of Photography, a True Story of Genius and Rivalry, co-authored by Helen Rappaport. The Fox Talbot Museum celebrates the life and work of William Henry Fox Talbot (1800-77). Fox Talbot created the first photographic negative in 1835, taken of a small window at his home, Lacock Abbey.

See here for more information: http://livestream.com/msualumni/RogerWatson

An historic agreement between the Science Museum Group (SMG) and the Victoria and Albert Museum (V&A) is set to create the world’s foremost collection on the art of photography according to a press release published by the V&A Museum.

• World’s leading collection on the art of photography to be created at the V&A
• RPS Collection to move to V&A London
• National Media Museum to focus on STEM subjects
• No future national museum of photography

The museums have announced that more than 400,000 objects from SMG’s three-million-strong photography collection, held at the National Media Museum, will be transferred to the V&A. These photographs, cameras, books and manuscript material will join the V&A’s existing collection of 500,000 photographs to create an International Photography Resource Centre. The new Centre will provide the public with a world-class facility to access this consolidated collection, which will become the single largest collection on the art of photography in the world.

V&A Director, Martin Roth, said: “The V&A and Science Museum Group have shared origins and uniting our complementary collections will create a peerless historical and artistic photography resource. Our ambitious plans for enhancing digital access, collaborative research, touring exhibitions and creating an International Photography Resource Centre will mean that future generations of visitors and researchers will benefit from these examples of the most important artistic developments in artistic photographic history.”

Dr Michael Pritchard, Director-General of the RPS, said: “The RPS has worked closely with the National Media Museum since 2003 to ensure that the world-class RPS Collection of photographs, technology, books and documents from 1827 to 2016 has grown and developed. I am pleased that we can further enhance the RPS Collection’s stature alongside the V&A’s own art photography collection and make it more widely available to the public and scholars and ensuring it remains a prime resource for future generations.  The RPS is extremely fortunate to benefit from the support and expertise of one of the world’s most revered cultural institutions.”

A commitment has been given that the RPS Collection will be retained as a distinct entity and there will be negotiations over the coming weeks to ensure that the the current partnership agreement with the National Media Museum is carried over to the V&A. While the move will prove beneficial in opening up access to the RPS Collection the Society is concerned that the absence of a single institution with the curatorial expertise to collect and interpret all aspects of photography beyond its art will lead to a selective and narrow appreciation of photography that existed before the formation of the National Media Museum in 1983 when the V&A and Science Museum worked independently.

There will be challenges for the V&A which houses the national collection of art photography to deal with photographic technology and science that forms a key part of the RPS Collection. The Society will be keen to see the V&A expand its remit to take responsibility for the National Photography Collection. There will be further announcements over the coming weeks regarding the transfer, timings and impact on the other collections held at the National Media Museum and senior curatorial staff have entered a period of consultation regarding their jobs. 

Once transferred, the collection will be stored, digitised and made accessible for study. In the short term, the permanent gallery space dedicated to photographs at the V&A will be doubled. A second phase will see the opening of an International Photography Resource Centre to provide unprecedented opportunities for access, collaborative research and education with this unrivalled collection. As part of the agreement, the V&A will work closely with SMG to give access to the transferred collections for future scholarship and exhibitions.

The National Media Museum in Bradford – one of the four museums that make up SMG – is refocusing its photography collections to align with its own strategic emphasis on the science, technology and culture of light and sound. The National Media Museum will retain the collections which support an understanding of the development of photographic processes (such as the Kodak Museum collection), the ongoing cultural impact of photography (such as the Daily Herald archive) as well as photographic archives that have specific relevance to Bradford (such as the Impressions Gallery archive). A new £1.5 million interactive light and sound gallery is due to open in March 2017.

See more here: http://www.rps.org/news/2016/january/rps-collection-to-move-to-vanda-london

There is more background relevant to Bradford here: http://www.thetelegraphandargus.co.uk/business/14244537.National_Media_Museum_to_lose_part_of_its_art_of_photography_collection/

Sir Kenneth Corfield, the designer of the Corfield Periflex series and, later, the WA77 and Architect cameras, died on 11 January, aged 91 years. With Brian Gould he ensured that the Gandolfi company survived. He enjoyed a successful career in business as chairman and chief executive of STC. He was a life member of the Royal Photographic Society. Amateur Photographer carries a short report here: http://www.amateurphotographer.co.uk/latest/photo-news/sir-kenneth-corfield-founder-of-last-successful-british-camera-range-dies-aged-91-68993:

Michael Pritchard writes...I first met Sir Ken in the 1980s when would attend the camera auctions at Christie's. Despite his role as a leader of industry he was always an engineer at heart as epitomised by his Corfield camera - the last commercially successful British camera range. Sir Ken was always friendly and helpful and willing to answer questions on his cameras. He remained fascinated by camera technology long after the final Corfield camera was sold and combined his technical background with that of an historian to great effect. For many of us his great legacy will be the Periflex camera.

Please comment with your own memories of Sir Ken. 

Image, top right: © reserved; collection National Portrait Gallery, London.

The science Museum has announced the latest in its series of Research Seminars. They are open to students, museum professionals and academics with an interest in the history of science, technology, engineering, medicine and maths; museums, their audiences and collections. Of particular note, on 15 March, Ella Ravilious will discuss Photography at the South Kensington Museum/V&A. 

The South Kensington Museum (later renamed the Victoria and Albert Museum) made, used and collected photographs from its earliest beginnings in the 1850s through to the present. This activity had many purposes and the photographic prints were viewed and used in myriad ways. The photographs of art objects and artefacts made by the Photographic Studio and the photographs collected by the National Art Library, the Circulation Department and the Photographs Collection together constitute a formidable resource. The shared photographic history between the Science Museum and the V&A is rich and include connections which are still coming to light today.

All seminars take place between 1-2pm in the Dana Study, Dana Research Centre and Library, 165 Queen’s Gate. Bring a packed lunch. 

In a blog posting the New York Public Library announced that out-of-copyright materials in NYPL Digital Collections would be available as high-resolution downloads and, in its words 'No permission required, no hoops to jump through: just go forth and reuse!' 

The release of more than 180,000 digitized items represents both a simplification and an enhancement of digital access to a trove of unique and rare materials: a removal of administration fees and processes from public domain content, and also improvements to interfaces — popular and technical — to the digital assets themselves. Online users of the NYPL Digital Collections website will find more prominent download links and filters highlighting restriction-free content; while more technically inclined users will also benefit from updates to the Digital Collections API enabling bulk use and analysis, as well as data exports and utilities posted to NYPL's GitHub account. These changes are intended to facilitate sharing, research and reuse by scholars, artists, educators, technologists, publishers, and Internet users of all kinds. All subsequently digitized public domain collections will be made available in the same way, joining a growing repository of open materials.

To encourage novel uses of the NYPL's digital resources, it is also accepting applications for a new Remix Residency program. Administered by the Library's digitization and innovation team, NYPL Labs, the residency is intended for artists, information designers, software developers, data scientists, journalists, digital researchers, and others to make transformative and creative uses of digital collections and data,and the public domain assets in particular. Two projects will be selected, receiving financial and consultative support from Library curators and technologists.

To provide further inspiration for reuse, the NYPL Labs team has also released several demonstration projects delving into specific collections, as well as a visual browsing tool allowing users to explore the public domain collections at scale. These projects, which suggest just a few of the myriad investigations made possible by fully opening these collections, include:

• a "mansion builder" game, exploring floor plans of grand turn-of-the-century New York apartments; 
• a then-and-now comparison of New York's Fifth Avenue, juxtaposing 1911 wide angle photographs with Google Street View; and
• a "trip planner" using locations extracted from mid-20th century motor guides that listed hotels, restaurants, bars, and other destinations where Black travelers would be welcome.

The public domain release spans the breadth and depth of NYPL's holdings, from the Library's rich New York City collection, historic maps, botanical illustrations, unique manuscripts, photographs, ancient religious texts, and more. Materials include:

• Berenice Abbott's iconic documentation of 1930s New York for the Federal Art Project
• Farm Security Administration photographs by Walker Evans, Dorothea Lange, Gordon Parks, and others
• Manuscripts of American literary masters like Walt Whitman, Henry David Thoreau, and Nathaniel Hawthorne
• Papers and correspondence of founding American political figures like Alexander Hamilton, Thomas Jefferson, and James Madison
• Sheet music for popular American songs at the turn of the 20th century
• WPA-era lithographs, etchings, and pastels by African American artists
• Lewis Hine's photographs of Ellis Island immigrants and social conditions in early 20th century America
• Anna Atkins' cyanotypes of British algae, the first recorded photographic work by a woman (1843)
• Handscrolls of the Tale of Genji, created in 1554
• Medieval and Renaissance illuminated manuscripts from Western Europe
• Over 20,000 maps and atlases documenting New York City, North America, and the world
• More than 40,000 stereoscopic views documenting all regions of the United States 

Visit nypl.org/publicdomain for information about the materials related to the public domain update and links to all of the projects demonstrating creative reuse of public domain materials. 

Person Specification

Qualifications

• A Postgraduate degree in art history/history of photography or related field, with a specialisation in photography and/or new media, or an equivalent combination of qualification and experience.

• Ph.D. in art history / history or equivalent expertise of art is desirable.

• At least three year’s relevant work experience within a museum or gallery environment working on displays or exhibitions.

• An understanding and engagement with interpretation practices and a willingness to work directly with staff across the Gallery to generate and deliver changes to interpretation.

• Experience of and enthusiasm for giving gallery talks and presentations to the public and among peers and writing text for a general public audience.

• Experience of managing junior staff.

• The ability to speak with authority about lens-based media, as well as trends and key figures in the history of photography as they pertain to NPG collections from the 19^th century to the present.

• A strong interest and excellent knowledge of British art, history and portraiture in the given period.

• Excellent written and verbal communication skills, the ability to copy edit text to a high standard of accuracy, write up research and edit existing texts producing clear and engaging copy for a public audience.

• A commitment to undertake academic research in a relevant field and evidence of research outputs.

• An interest in and knowledge of a variety of different types of museum interpretation and commentary including in gallery texts, web microsites, blogs, digital in gallery texts, social media etc.

• Training or interest in new media (film, video, electronic media).

• Well-developed interpersonal skills, the ability to support the Head of Photographs and work on their own initiative, co-ordinating and liaising with other curatorial staff, and staff across the Gallery.

• Exemplary research skills using published and primary art historical sources and familiarity with online research databases on history, biography and art.

• Excellent organisational, research and planning skills, coupled with the ability to work calmly under pressure, meet tight deadlines and retain excellent attention to detail.

• Good computer literacy with databases, a variety of IT packages (Word, Excel, PowerPoint etc.) and the ability to generate image spreadsheets from collections databases.

• A good eye for design and an understanding of the issues in designing displays and hanging works of art.

Other

• A demonstrable interest and commitment to the work of the National Portrait Gallery and an awareness of the demands and responsibilities of a National Museum collection.

• A genuine and demonstrable interest in the practice of interpretation and audience development within museums.

• Ability to research and develop the biography of the sitters and artists providing insight into photographic compositions and their history and significance.

• Willingness to stay up to date with contemporary developments in photography and new media and desire to explore future trends.

• The post may require occasional evening and weekend work as agreed.

Period of Appointment

This is a permanent post.

Hours

Your contracted hours of work will be 40 hours (5 days) per week, from Monday to Friday, including a lunch break of one hour a day.

Salary

The salary for this post will be £27,849 per annum.

Annual Leave

Your annual leave allowance is 25 days per annum, rising to 29 days at the start of the annual leave year following completion of five years’ service, and up to 33 days after 10 years service.

Place of Work

Most of the work is based in the Gallery at St Martin’s Place, but all staff are required to work at other locations if necessary.

Equality

The Gallery believes in the employment and advancement of people solely on their ability to do the job required.  When recruiting people, we will therefore disregard their gender, marital status, race, age, colour, nationality, ethnic origin, religion and sexual orientation.  There will be no unfair discrimination on the basis of disability.  If you would like to submit your application in a different format we are happy to allow this.  Please contact us (telephone: 020 7306 0055 email: personnel@npg.org.uk) so that we may discuss suitable alternatives.

Pension

Pension benefits are provided under the Principal Civil Service Pension Scheme (PCSPS).

Probation and Trial Period

All appointments are subject to satisfactory employment and character references, security clearance and eligibility to work in the UK. There is a probationary period of 1 year for all permanent posts. The probationary period for this post is 12 months.

Data Protection Act

Information provided by you as part of your application will be used in the recruitment process.  Any data about you will be held securely with access restricted to those involved in dealing with your application in the recruitment process.  Once this process is completed the data relating to unsuccessful applicants will be stored for a maximum of 6 months and then destroyed.  If you are the successful candidate, your application form will be retained and form the basis of your personnel record.  Information provided by you on the Equal Opportunities Monitoring Form will be used to monitor the National Portrait Gallery’s equal opportunities policy and practices.  By signing and submitting your completed application form you are giving your consent to your data being stored and processed (if you submit your application by e-mail and the application form is un-signed we will assume that consent by you is given) for the purpose of the recruitment process, equal opportunities monitoring and your personnel record if you are the successful candidate.

Season Tickets

Interest free loans are available for the purchase of a season ticket for travel to work.

Please return your completed application form to:

Personnel at: personnel@npg.org.uk

Or by post

Caroline Speed
Head of Personnel
National Portrait Gallery
2 St Martin’s Place
London
WC2H 0HE

By 9am on Wednesday 20 January 2016.

We are expecting to hold interviews on Friday 29 January, 2016. Please indicate on your form if you are unavailable on this date. Please indicate on the form if you will not be available on any particular days during this week.  

If you are delivering your application by hand, please take it to the reception desk at 39-45 Orange Street.

To ensure the best possible use of our limited resources we are unable to respond to every application.  If you have not had a response to your application by 12 February, 2016, please assume that you have been unsuccessful on this occasion.

We would like to thank you for your time and effort in returning your application.

Bearnes Hampton & Littlewood of Exeter is offering a selection of photographs from Herbert Ponting, Noel Chanan, Lewis Hine and Cecil Beaton on 19 January 2016. The lots can be viewed on its website www.bhandl.co.uk  in the Picture Section of the January Two Day Fine Art Sale [FS29] or through the link http://www.bhandl.co.uk/sales/assets/FS/2016/01/19/FS190116-pictures.pdf

Image: Herbert George Ponting [1870-1935], Giant Bamboos of Peradeniya, Ceylon, carbon print.

Society “Liber pro arte” in collaboration with Polish Association of Photography Historians and a yearly journal Dagerotyp is organizing an international conference Discovering “Peripheries”: Photographic Histories in Central and Eastern Europe which aims to explore the wealth of photographic practices in the region now commonly referred to as the former Communist bloc. As, generally speaking, photography in this part of the world has been understudied, the conference intends to promote discussion on its cultural, social and political characteristics in contexts such as national and state ideology, art, museums, education, business, everyday life and journalism.The event will be held from 31 May-1 June 2016 in Warsaw, Poland.

The organisers welcome applications from all disciplines and career stages for 20 minutes papers. Abstracts of no more than 300 words should be sent by 15 February 2016 to conference2016@liberproarte.eu 

For further information regarding the call for papers: http://liberproarte.eu/?page_id=422

De Montfort University's Photographic History Research Centre has announced its Spring term seminars. They are held on Tuesdays from 4-6pm, Hugh Aston Building, and are free and open to all.

‘Type-cast?’: Rethinking Studio Photography in the Hill Stations of British India
January 19    (Hugh Aston 2.08)
Professor Clare Harris (University of Oxford)

It is well known that from the 1860s onwards, individuals from all over the Indian subcontinent were photographed and classified according to ethnic, religious, and caste criteria, and thereby reduced to ‘type’ within the colonial anthropological project. This paper examines a parallel but neglected phenomenon of the late nineteenth century: the production of ‘type’ photography in commercial studios in the Himalayas and its reception in the ‘visual economy’ of the British Empire. By paying close attention to the activities and outputs of photographic studios and considering them as sites of transcultural encounter rather than of strict segregation between coloniser and colonised, I seek to reverse the process of ‘type’-casting that was inflicted on the local actors who performed within them.

Personal wartime photography in Egypt, 1898—1918 
February 16  ( Hugh Aston 2.08)
Paul Fox (University of York)   

Historians of the First World War have recently turned their attention to ‘personal photography’: the taking of photographs with privately owned portable cameras, and the disposal of the resulting prints in personal photograph albums or collections. The paper will contest the notion that this wartime phenomenon was without precedent by comparing First World War practice in Egypt with the way early portable cameras had been employed by British officers participating in the 1898 campaign to defeat a jihadist uprising in Sudan.

The paper will examine how privately owned portable cameras were used in the Sudan, and trace the public afterlife of photographs returned to Britain. It will then turn to the personal photography of members of the Royal Flying Corps based in Egypt during the First World War. It will explore the impact of the proliferation of camera use to include soldiers of all ranks, not least the potential to present life on active service from new social perspectives.

Travelling Memories: the Boissonnas photo-albums Salonique et ses basiliques (1913) and Smyrne (1919) 
March 15  (Hugh Aston 4.15)
Dr Colette Wilson  (University of Westminster)  

Two photograph albums by the Swiss photographer Frédéric Boissonnas and his son Edmond-Edouard, Salonique et ses basiliques (1913) and Smyrne (1919), capture Salonica (Thessalonika) and Smyrna (Izmir) at crucial turning points in their histories before a chain of events ignited Greek and Turkish nationalism leading to their near destruction. While maintaining an awareness of the ‘locatedness of memory’ within a national context (Radstone), the albums, with their clear focus on Greek-Christian national identity and heritage, arguably function as carefully designed propaganda tools, the aim of which was to create a memory that would travel transculturally (Erll) around the world gaining support for Greece which hoped to unite all the Ottoman lands with Greek populations into a single Greek state, whose capital would be Constantinople. Greece’s ‘Great Idea’ may have died in the flames of Smyrna, but it lives on in the Boissonnas albums and their online presence.

Contact in case of queries: Professor Elizabeth Edwards eeddwards@dmu.ac.uk/ Dr Kelley Wilder kwilder@dmu.ac.uk

The Royal Photographic Society's Historical Group presents the Society's Hurter and Driffield Memorial lecture which this year will be given by Dr Sam Weller FRSA who will be talking about: Kodak Moments: A look through the rear view mirror. Sam was formerly  Director of the Kodak European Research Laboratories in Cambridge.

The lecture takes place in London on 26 January 2016 from 5.30pm.

See more here: http://rps.org/events/2016/january/26/hurter--driffield-memorial-lecture

The work of photographer Frank Hurley is used on eight new stamps being issued by the Royal Mail on 7 January 2016. The set is being issued to commemorate Ernest Shackleton's polar voyage of 1914-1916. Shackleton's ship Endurance became stuck in ice and Shackleton with six companions then braved a voyage of 720 nautical miles in an open boat to the whaling stations of South Georgia to get help for his crew. They were finally rescued in August 1916.

The stamps' images have been created from the original glass photographic plates held by the Scott Polar Research Institute, Cambridge, and the Royal Geographical Society, London, and taken by Hurley.   the Mint Stamps feature eight scenes captured by pioneering photographer Frank Hurley. The subjects are: Entering the Antarctic Ice 1st Class, Endurance Frozen in Pack Ice 1st Class, Striving to Free Endurance £1.00, Trapped in a Pressure Crack £1.00, Patience Camp £1.33, Safe Arrival at Elephant Island £1.33, Setting Out for South Georgia £1.52, and Rescue of Endurance Crew £1.52

See more here 

The Historical Group of The Royal Photographic Society has arranged another of its popular - and useful - Research Days on Saturday, 9 January 2016 at the School of Arts, Birkbeck, University of London. The day will consist of more than twelve speakers presenting short papers about their research and work in progress. Topics range from Arthur Marshall, Isabella Bird and George Washington Wilson, to Simla and daguerreotypy amongst many others. 

The day will be of interest to anyone interested in researching photographic history, students and genealogists.  Places are limited. To book a place click here: http://www.rps.org/events/2016/january/09/research-day

This new publication by Steven F Joseph is the first comprehensive and richly illustrated overview of historical Belgian photographic literature. It presents comprehensive survey of both of illustrated books and of technical publications. It makes a major contribution to academic study in the field, with a corpus composed of 681 entries and, for each title, indicates locations of surviving copies in institutional collections in Belgium and elsewhere. An introductory essay plots the development of photographic publishing in Belgium, making full use of primary and secondary sources. An album of over eighty images draws on the rich iconography of early Belgian photographic literature, most reprinted for the first time. It is published in English and French. 

440 pages, €69,50, published by Leuven University Press. 

For more information, including a full table of contents and sample pages see: http://upers.kuleuven.be/en/book/9789462700475

The Manfred & Hanna Heiting Fonds / Rijksmuseum Fonds enables the Rijksmuseum to annually award two postgraduate Fellowships that stimulate outstanding object-based, photo-historical research by prospective curators from the Netherlands or abroad.

Fellowships are awarded for a six-month period. The focus of research should be related to the National Photo Collection held by the Rijksmuseum’s Print Room. The Rijksmuseum will endeavor to enable publication of the Fellow’s research. This could be an in-depth study of one photograph or photo book and/or its distribution; on a series of photographs or part of an oeuvre; on the aesthetic or technical aspects of photography; on the wider context of a photo book or album; or on combinations of art-historical research and research on materials and techniques. 

The Rijksmuseum Fellowship Programme
As part of the Rijksmuseum Fellowship Programme, the Manfred & Hanna Heiting Fellowship is set out to train a new generation of museum professionals: inquisitive object-based specialists who will further develop understanding of Netherlandish art and history for the future. The Rijksmuseum will provide working space for the Fellows, in order to stimulate an exchange of knowledge, ideas and experience. Access will be provided to all necessary information in the museum, as well as to the library and the resources of the Netherlands Institute for Art History (RKD) in The Hague.

Application and procedure
The closing date for all applications is 13 March 2016, at 6:00 p.m. (Amsterdam time/CET). Selection will be made by an international committee in April 2016. The committee consists of eminent scholars in the relevant fields of study from European universities and institutions, and members of the curatorial staff of the Rijksmuseum. Applicants will be notified by 1 May 2016. All Fellowships will start in September 2016.

For further information click here. 

The V&A Photographs department will be producing a display in Gallery 38A titled: The Camera Exposed. It will explore themes around the presence of ‘the camera’, or some trace of it, in photographs. Spanning the history of photography, the display will present works that explore this theme different ways, from photographers’ self-portraits with their cameras to more conceptual pieces. Artists featured include Charles Thurston Thompson, Lady Hawarden, Bill Brandt, Richard Avedon and Henri Cartier-Bresson.

Image: Charles Thurston Thompson, ‘Venetian mirror circa 1700, from the collection of Mr. John Webb’, 1853

Bronwen Colquhoun, Assistant Curator of Photography at the V&A, London, is leaving to take up the recently advertised post of Senior Curator of Photography at the National Museum of Wales in February 2016. The role was noted on BPH in October - click here to see the job description. Bron has been with the Photographs Department since 2012.

Her PhD, which she was awarded earlier this year from Newcastle University, examined how photo-sharing website, Flickr The Commons, supports community engagement and builds new knowledge and meaning around historic photographic collections.

She has previously worked at the Library of Congress, Northern Gallery for Contemporary Art, English Heritage and volunteered at the National Media Museum. 

The Science Museum is to present a major exhibition exploring the work of British photography pioneer William Henry Fox Talbot. Fox Talbot: Dawn of the Photograph, which opens in the Museum’s Media Space in April, will present the birth of photography in Britain within its industrial and social context, and reveal the extent of Talbot’s remarkable experiments as the figurehead of a new and influential medium that changed the way people saw themselves and the world.

The Science Museum Group, as custodians of the world’s most comprehensive and important collection of work by William Henry Fox Talbot, is uniquely placed to tell the story of how photography was borne out of a 19th century desire to experiment with emerging ideas and technologies. Photography was one of many fields in which Talbot was working, but it was his invention of the negative-positive process which formed the basis of photography around the world for over 150 years, that immortalised him as the father of the medium.

Five years after making his discovery public he published The Pencil of Nature, the first commercial publication to be illustrated using photographs. Alongside his artistic and scientific aspirations for the medium, Talbot had one eye on its commercial potential. The exhibition is a testament to Talbot’s magical and industrial visions for his invention, ranging from the delicate capture of natural specimens to functional ambitions for photography as a means of mass production.

In 1934, Talbot’s granddaughter Matilda organised an exhibition marking the centenary of his first photographic experiments at Lacock Abbey, the site of production for what is considered to be the earliest photographic negative - the latticed window - taken using an improvised ‘mousetrap’ camera. Shortly after this exhibition, approximately 6,500 items were transferred from Talbot’s former home to the Science Museum so that his unique and valuable works, including some incredibly fragile items, could be preserved for the nation. Some of the earliest examples of his processes will be displayed for the first time in this exhibition.

Russell Roberts, co-curator and Reader in Photography at the University of South Wales said: ‘Photography without question was one of the most profound inventions of 19th century Britain. Talbot not only set in motion a new way of seeing but, through his writings and experiments, identified the distinctiveness of photography as an art, science and industry. He left an extensive visual record of the medium’s possibilities that reveals a sophisticated consciousness at work. This exhibition allows us to fully appreciate the extent of his achievements and to reinforce the impact of his invention on social and cultural life.’

Greg Hobson, co-curator and Curator of Photographs, National Media Museum said: ‘William Henry Fox Talbot wasn’t only one of the key figures in the invention of photography; he anticipated its uses and usefulness with intelligence and a vision for its critical role in modernity. It is a delight to be able to examine these significant contributions through our remarkable holdings in the National Photography Collection.'

Fox Talbot: Dawn of the Photograph explores how the work of this pioneer bridged art, science and industry to define what was possible in the formative moments of photography. The Science Museum’s industrial collections will complement the early Talbot work in the exhibition. They will situate Talbot’s experiments in the context of other contemporary innovations and set the scene for how people shared ideas at the time.

The exhibition also explores the relationships between a network of photographers who gravitated towards Talbot’s process but who each took photography into different territory. Assessing their artistic contribution and social legacy, it reflects on how enthusiasm for photography was initially limited to a small close-knit, elite group of people.

Towards the end of the exhibition, the work of Talbot’s contemporaries including Anna Atkins, Hill and Adamson, and Calvert Jones will be displayed in an exploration of how technology, techniques and practices were shared or inspired others in different parts of the country to a variety of ends.

Fox Talbot: Dawn of the Photography
14 April – 11 September 2016, Media Space, Science Museum, London
Admission £8, Seniors £7, Concessions £6 (prices include donation)

William Henry Fox Talbot, a special catalogue published to accompany the exhibition will feature 100 high-quality reproductions of Talbot’s work, RRP £27.95.

For more about the exhibition, visit www.sciencemuseum.org.uk/foxtalbot