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In the annals of mountaineering history, few tales were as compelling and transformative as Edward Whymper’s. First published in 1871, this classic work chronicles the first successful climb of the Matterhorn in 1865, a feat that heralded mountaineering as a popular sport and spawned a new genre – that of the high-thrills adventure book. It was soon recognized as a masterpiece and the Times wrote about his gripping bestseller, The Ascent of the Matterhorn, that ‘you can almost hear the tinkle of bells on the Apls; you breathe the fresh fragrance of the pine trees’.

Almost 150 years later Whymper’s memoir is republished for the first time in an expanded illustrated edition. Whymper was not only a keen mountaineer but also a Victorian driven by an insatiable curiosity. One of his pursuits was photography and in 1874 he was the first man to lug a mobile camera on to the Matterhorn to take pictures. He used these pictures for his lantern-lecture tours around the world and they are included for the first time in this edition.

In the nineteenth century the book opened a window on to the Alps but in the 21^st century, it is still a landmark in autobiography for ramblers and climbers alike. Bill Bryson has long been an admirer of Whymper's work, which is one of his favourites. In his view,  is not just a mountaineering classic but a testament to the indomitable human spirit. Bryson appreciates Whymper's meticulous attention to detail and his ability to convey the awe-inspiring beauty and formidable dangers of the Alps. According to him Whymper’s ‘glorious’ narrative transcends its genre with its leap from exhilaration to complete desolation, offering a dramatic reflection of human ambition and the relentless pursuit of dreams.

Today the Matterhorn is still treacherous with its implacable ridges and it certainly was on the day of the ascent, made on July 14, 1865, for the men in the their tweeds and rudimentary mountaineering equipment and skills. Whymper's team consisted of seven climbers, including Michel Croz, Lord Francis Douglas, Charles Hudson, and Douglas Hadow. Their summit success was overshadowed by tragedy during the descent, when Hadow slipped, causing a catastrophic fall that claimed the lives of Croz, Douglas, Hadow and Hudson. They had crossed the fine line between triumph and disaster and Whymper could never unsee the sudden dispatch to their deaths of the men he had led to victory.

Whymper’s account is both a gripping adventure story and a meticulous chronicle of his repeated attempts and eventual triumph.In her foreword, Theresa May reflects on the historical and personal significance of Whymper’s journey. She draws parallels between the challenges faced by Whymper and those encountered in political and personal arenas, highlighting the timeless virtues of perseverance, courage, and leadership. May's insights add a contemporary dimension to Whymper’s tale, emphasizing its relevance to modern readers.

The Ascent of the Matterhorn. The forgotten photographs
Edward Whymper, foreword by Theresa May 
Gibson Square, 2025
ISBN: 9781783342846
£16.99, 288 pages

The National Science and Media Museum will open its much-anticipated permanent Sound and Vision galleries to the public on Thursday 10 July. This marks the culmination of a £6.8 million transformation of the museum, the new galleries span two floors of the museum, showcasing world-class collections of photography, film, television, animation, gaming and sound technologies in new and innovative ways. The museum review here partially re-opened in January. 

Thanks to a transformational gift from The National Lottery Heritage Fund – made possible by money raised by National Lottery players, the new galleries feature over 500 exhibits, a new art commission and a range of interactive displays. Designed by award-winning AOC architecture and futureproofing the museum for years to come, the galleries have been years in the making. Their opening marks the completion of the Sound and Vision project, exploring globally significant stories of technological innovation and social change.  

Consultation and collaboration with key audiences and community groups has been at the centre of the creation of the new galleries, ensuring the stories told resonate with as broad an audience as possible. Underpinning the galleries has been a vibrant set of activities, supporting greater access, representation and volunteering opportunities, focused on enabling more people to engage with the museum and its collections.  

Throughout the project, the museum has engaged and consulted with community leaders, access groups, young people and schools including SHINE West Bowling, Morley Street Resource Centre, and Bradford Deaf Centre, among many others. Volunteers have also played an integral role in the project's development, with volunteers contributing over 1900 hours of time to consultations and engagement activities.

The Sound and Vision galleries have been shaped by the voices of people from Bradford and beyond. Through extensive collaboration, local communities have helped to influence not only which stories are told in the new galleries, but how. The museum’s Youth Forum and Access Panel played a key role in shaping the space, offering fresh perspectives and encouraging the museum to think differently about how to present star objects and stories from their collections to make them accessible and engaging to all.    

Partners such as Allstar and BCB Radio have brought vital local perspectives to the galleries, reflecting the creativity and diversity of Bradford’s cultural scene whilst creating narratives that are relatable to people both from the district and those visiting. Individual contributors such as Paul Seal, a disabled gamer whose gaming setup enables him to continue to play through adapted technology, also shared personal insights that bring depth and authenticity to the galleries, highlighting how innovation in media technology can empower individuals. Collaboration with the Marshall Factory, a renowned name in sound technology, further added industry insight and national perspective to the galleries. Together, these contributions have helped make the galleries more inclusive, and representative of both local communities and wider society.  

Marking a new era and launching during a momentous year for Bradford, these object rich and interactive gallery spaces confirm the museum’s position as a national museum rooted in its community. As well as spotlighting hundreds of previously unseen exhibits, visitors who know the venue well will sense echoes of the museum’s past, with a Dalek greeting them on Level 5, a delightful new exhibit on loan from Aardman animation studios, and charming film footage of the museum’s now retired magic flying carpet, which was once a firm favourite with visitors, captured by the legendary Bradford Movie Makers.  

Jo Quinton-Tulloch, Director of the National Science and Media Museum commented: “We are thrilled to be launching our new permanent Sound and Vision galleries this month. They have been a true labour of love and collaboration, and they showcase our incredible collections in new and innovative ways. Our collections and the rich narratives they tell touch upon all our lives, from the first photographic negative and film footage to the advent of radio and television, and the power of sound technologies to bring us together. Our Sound and Vision galleries showcase how everyday objects have the power to be extraordinary.    

We have worked closely with a huge range of people to develop the galleries, ensuring these spaces work for everyone and that our visitors feel represented in the stories we tell. Consultation with our local communities has been central in the development of Sound and Vision and it feels especially significant to launch the galleries during Bradford’s year as UK City of Culture. We hope the galleries will be a key focal point in our city’s momentous year and for a long time to come.  And we are incredibly grateful to the National Lottery Heritage Fund and the support of National Lottery players for making Sound and Vision possible. We can’t wait to welcome visitors to explore our new galleries soon.”  

Helen Featherstone, Director, England, North at The National Lottery Heritage Fund added:  “The Sound and Vision galleries at the National Science and Media Museum are a cultural gem for the city, telling the story behind the photographic, film and sound technologies that have played such a big role in our lives. We’re incredibly proud to have funded these wonderful galleries thanks to National Lottery players."

Look out for more details and pictures shortly

The V&A Museum is seeking a Project Archivist and Project Cataloguer to work on and support the Royal Photographic Society (RPS) digitisation project. The RPS Project is a vital part of the V&A’s broader programme of cataloguing, digitisation, collections care and access. It aims to safeguard the collection and provide meaningful access to benefit and inspire current and future generations. The initiative is headed by recently appointed Amy Mayhew, who reports to V&A senior curator of photography Martin Barnes. 

Project Archivist. The main purpose of the role is to catalogue the Royal Photographic Society archive in accordance with the International Standard for Archival Description (ISAD(G)) using the Museum’s Collections Management System.

Project Cataloguer. The main purpose of the role is to create new catalogue records for objects in the RPS collection and, with the Project Manager, to supervise volunteers to input basic cataloguing data. The V&A seeks to accelerate digitization through a new RPS Project Team, with cataloguing as a central focus.

Both roles are three-year, full-time, fixed-term contracts. 

The RPS collection is the largest and most important collection of photography at the V&A. It contains many items of global significance, including some of the earliest photographs, artworks by well-known photographers, invaluable documents of history and evidence of 200 years of technical and scientific advances. The collection numbers an estimated 310,000 photographs, negatives, pieces of photographic technology, books, journals and archive items. Some 90% of the collection remains to be catalogued, imaged and digitised. 

Applications for both jobs close on 18 July 2025. See the links above for full details. 

Amy Mayhew has been appointed Project Manager for the five-year digitisation project of the Royal Photographic Society (RPS) Collection at the V&A Museum. The job was advertised earlier this year as a five-year fixed-term contract. 

Amy joins the V&A from the British Film Institute where she spent over eleven years in various roles. Latterly she specialised in the management and delivery of large-scale digital access cultural heritage projects. Previous work includes the digitisation of film, videotape, and stills collections, as well as 35mm film printing, the Film on Film Festival, and Britain on Film.  She has a Masters in World Cinema from Birkbeck. 

The new role is to plan, budget, monitor, report on and drive forward the RPS Digitisation Project. The V&A's stewardship of the RPS Collection is at an inflexion point and the digitisation will start with the RPS photographs ultimately making them available online with full catalogue descriptions. Detailed plans are still being determined but the work may extend into some of the archival material and, perhaps, the technology colllection later in the project. 

The V&A is assembling a team to support the initiative and two new archivist and cataloguing jobs are currently open. The project will also be making use of volunteers to bring specialist and practical skills to the project.  

Image: courtesy of Amy Mayhew

The Stereoscopic Picturesque is an interdisciplinary study of nineteenth-century 3D photography and its relation to the picturesque tradition in art, literature, and tourism. The study focuses on the invention of the stereoscope, originally a laboratory device for demonstrating the nature of three-dimensional vision, and the simultaneous invention of photography, in order to show how early stereo photographers used the optics of the stereoscope to extend the possibilities of picturesque representation.

Their images also made 'virtual travel' possible for an international mass audience, allowing millions of people to explore places and natural wonders that they would otherwise never have seen. Many of these places had deep literary associations – Wordsworth’s Lake District, for instance, or Scott’s Trossachs – and the stereography of these regions constitutes an important, yet largely unexplored, chapter in the reception history of these authors. Many of the photographs were deliberate attempts to encourage the preservation of environmentally sensitive sites, something the realism of photography and the 3D presentation of the stereoscope made especially effective. 

The Stereoscopic Picturesque combines fields of study that have rarely been brought into such close contiguity: the history of science, art history, the history of photography, literature, and environmentalism. The result is an unprecedented look at Victorian popular culture and the way stereo photography shaped their ways of seeing the world.

The Stereoscopic Picturesque. Nineteenth-Century Photography, Literary Landscapes, and the Third Dimension
Bruce Graver
Liverpool University Press, 2025
ISBN:9781835537916 (Hardcover) |eISBN:9781835537923 (PDF) |eISBN:9781835537930 (ePub)
https://www.liverpooluniversitypress.co.uk/doi/book/10.3828/9781835537916

George Platt Lynes began his career photographing celebrities in the 1930s, and it’s those portraits along with his extravagant fashion work that he’s best remembered for today. However, George’s heart, his passion, and his greatest talent lay elsewhere, in his work with the male nude.

This work, sensuous and radically explicit for its time, has only recently begun being fully discovered and appreciated for the revolution that it represents — a man capturing his fantasies as a gift, a window to a future his camera saw coming before anyone else.

From visionary art director Sam Shahid, HIDDEN MASTER features a stunning collection of photography from the 1930s-50s, uncovering the life of Lynes less known: his gifted eye for the male form, his long-term friendships with Gertrude Stein. Christopher Ishwerwood and Alfred Kinsey, and his lasting influence as one of the first openly gay American artists. 

HIDDEN MASTER: THE LEGACY OF GEORGE PLATT LYNES
(Feature documentary, 96 mins, USA)
Directed by Sam Shahid
Peccadillo Pictures, 2025
UK cinema release 11 July 2025, digital platforms from August
You can view the trailer here:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YTPljOAhj8g

"Sleeping beauty"

When I am dead and in my grave
And all my bones are rotten.
When this you see remember me Lest I should be forgotten.”

This is the first posting on Art Blart on the phenomenon of postmortem photography for exhibitions on this subject are few and far between.

Any photograph is a “little death” which “refers to the concept of “la petite mort” or “the little death,” a French idiom and euphemism for the momentary loss of consciousness or breath, often associated with orgasm, but also used to describe the act of freezing a moment in time through photography. This concept suggests that photography, by capturing a specific moment, essentially stops time and thus, in a way, creates a small, contained death of that moment.” (Google AI Overview)

All photographs (and especially postmortem photography where the deceased are memorialised through images) can be seen as “memento mori”, a Latin phrase meaning “remember you must die,” reminding us that of the impermanence of life – for photographs “capture a moment in time, forever preserving a fleeting instant and highlighting the passage of time and the inevitability of death.” (Google AI Overview)

As Susan Sontag observed, “All photographs are memento mori. To take a photograph is to participate in another person’s (or thing’s) mortality, vulnerability, mutability.” (On Photography)

Victorians were faced with the vicissitudes of fortune, and death at any age was a common occurrence due to illness with no antibiotics available to treat the many lethal diseases. They became stoic in the face of the impermanence of life, stoic in the face of death and through photography, sought to record into permanence the likenesses of the departed (the beloved), so that they could remember and honour them. Photographs thus became symbols of mortality which encouraged reflection on the meaning and fleetingness of life…

But unlike a photographic self-portrait, where a human looks at their image (in which they are dead) which reminds them about their physical death in the future, an anterior future of which death is the stake (and the prick of discovery of this equivalence)1 - in postmortem photography the little death and the actual death are as one for the anterior future can never be viewed by the subject of the photograph (they are dead), a separation only revived in the heart and mind of another.

Through postmortem photography the deceased live in an interstitial space, forever brought back to life in the eyes of the viewer as we reawaken and reactivate their spirit in the world. I was once here and I am again. Remember me.

Thus the euphemism “sleeping” is appropriate (sleeping beauty awakened once more with a kiss), as the viewer transcends time bringing past dead back into living world – where past, present and future coalesce into single point in time – their death and our death connected through the gaze and the knowledge of our discontinuity. Eons contracted into an eternal moment.2

In this expanded-specific moment in time, through an awareness of our own dis/continuity, what we are doing is talking about something that is remarkable. We are moving towards a language that defines the human condition…

Dr Marcus Bunyan

‘Remember Me. Postmortems from the M. G. Jacob Collection’ and
‘Through Light. The First 20 Years of Photography in the Photo Library Collections’ at Biblioteca Panizzi, Reggio Emilia, Italy

24th April – 5th July, 2025

SEE THE FULL POSTING AT https://wp.me/pn2J2-v6N

1/ Roland Barthes, Camera Lucida (La Chambre claire), Section 39, 1980
2/ Marcus Bunyan. "This is not my favourite photograph," part of What makes a great photograph? at the Centre for Contemporary Photography (CCP), Fitzroy, Wednesday 5th December 2012 [Online] Cited 27/06/2025

Many thankx to the Biblioteca Panizzi and Michael G. Jacob for allowing me to publish the photographs in the posting. Please click on the photographs for a larger version of the image.

Main image:

Unknown photographer (American)
A sleeping man (detail)
c. 1846
Daguerreotype
Title given by the collector

Unknown photographer (American)
A sleeping girl
c. 1846
Daguerreotype
Title given by the collector

This conference-within-a-conference presents international scholarship on the history of stereoscopic photography and is part of the National Stereoscopic Association's 51st 3D-Con taking place at Minneapolis-St Paul from 3-11 August 2025. The conference is in person only.

The history papers comprise: 

Rephotographing Piazzi Smyth: Identifying People and places from his visit to Tenerife in 1856
José A. Betancourt, The University of Alabama in Huntsville

The First Stereoscopic Exchange Club (1859 – 1863)
Rebecca Sharpe, The Brian May Archive of Stereoscopy

The Legacy of Edward Lovejoy: De-Integraton of the Chicago Stereograph Market in the 1870s
William F. Zieske, Independent Researcher

Early Stereoscopic Photography and the Visual Construction of Iran in the 19th and Early 20th Century
Shahriar Khonsari, Independent Researcher

Guilherme Santos – Brazilian photographer of the 20th century
Roger Hama Sassaki, Universidade de São Paulo (Brazil)

Arthur Rothstein's Parallax Look
Eric Drysdale, Independent Researcher

Cold War Spatial Mapping: Medium Format Soviet 3D
Zachary Horton, University of Pittsburgh

Dahlonega Gold Mining in 3D!
Kenneth Watkins and Heather Abercrombie, Dahlonega Gold Museum State Historic Site

Details: https://3d-con.com/history.php

In celebration of International Women’s Day, 8 March 2026, and building on the success of our 2025 conference-a-thon, we invite scholars, practitioners, and enthusiasts to submit abstracts for participation in a free, online, global, 24-hour symposium dedicated to celebrating the contributions of women to the medium of photography from photography’s announcement in 1839 to now. This unique event aims to highlight the diverse and impactful work of women and female-identifying photographers, and those working with photography, across all cultures and time zones.

We seek 15-minute papers or proposed 30-minute panel discussions (with 3-4 participants listed who consent to participating) that explore a broad range of topics related to women’s contributions to photography. These may include but are not limited to:

Sworders has a eclectic private collection for auction on 9 July. The catalogue notes that 'over the past forty years, this collection has been an inspiration and source of daily pleasure. Like dreams, the unexpected connections between disparate objects can open doors to new curiosities, new passions. It is our hope that the surprising juxtapositions found here will spark fresh journeys of discovery for their new custodians.'

The auction includes a significant amount of photography commencing with large groups of Czech, American, Canadian, German, and Japanese photobooks and illustrated maagzines, themes 100 years of celebrity culture, daguerreotypes, photographs, stereographs, and albums, work by Richard Billingham, Lartigue, Anders Petersen, Tony Ray-Jones, Angus McBean, Mark Gerson, Simon Norfolk, Berenice Abbott, Robert Capa, Ilya Kabakov, František Drtikol, Henri Cartier-Bresson, Josef Sudek, Eve Arnold, Frederick Leslie Kenett, Cecil Beaton, Amelia Elizabeth Gimingham, large groups of mixed photography, themed lots including Ruskin, Czech, aviation, military, East European, cycling, boxing, theatre, film, stage, jazz, pop music, royalty, naval, civil war, medical, and press. 

DREAMS | A Unique Private Collection
Wednesday 9 July 2025 | 10am
In Person and Online

https://www.sworder.co.uk/auction/details/a1244-dreams--a-unique-private-collection/?au=1272

 Image: top: Tony Ray-Jones (1941-1972), 'A Portfolio of Fifteen Photographs 1967-1969' from 1975,  right: Blow Up, poster, 1967; left: Josef Sudek, lot 92; below, lot 38, A collection of flower and plant studies c.1890s and later, comprising various photographs of flower and plant studies by Amelia Elizabeth Gimingham

With a on-going renewal of interest in pictorialism this new book is a timely - and welcome - addition to the literature. It brings new insights in to one of the key photographic styles of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Pictorialism is a complex and multi-faceted movement. Initiated around 1890 in England, with antecendents back to the late 1850s, it rapidly spread across Europe and in the United States before reaching other parts of the globe. Its creators were mainly amateur photographers who wished to demonstrate the creative potential of photography and to liberate it from its simple function of copying or documenting by producing 'artistic' photographs able to convey the photographer's emotion. In order to do so, these photographers focused on what they called 'interpretation' and theorised the freedom to intervene in the making of an image, whether it be while taking the picture (soft focus lenses), on the negative (etching of the gelatine layer) or on the positive (use of specific printing processes such as platinum, carbon or gum bichromate, transforming deeply the image as recorded on the negative).

To defend their ideals and promote their vision of photography, the Pictorialists gathered in societies, clubs or brotherhoods, such as the Linked Ring in England, the Photo-Club de Paris in France, L’Effort in Belgium, or the Photo-Secession in the United States. They also organized countless international exhibitions dedicated to pictorial photography and published hundreds of illustrated books, magazines and portfolios, sumptuously printed in photogravure, the most famous example being Camera Work, founded by Alfred Stieglitz in 1903.

Popular at the turn of the twentieth century, the movement attracted numerous photographers and its leaders were known all over the world: Frederick H. Evans and James Craig Annan for Great-Britain, Robert Demachy and Constant Puyo for France, Heinrich Kühn and Hugo Henneberg for Austria, Alfred Stieglitz, Edward Steichen, Clarence H. White or Gertrude Käsebier for the United States. 

Eventually challenged by a new generation of photographers who wanted to develop an aesthetic based upon the 'inner qualities' of photography (objectivity, clarity, sharpness), Pictorialism was gradually replaced by New Vision after the First World War. Nevertheless, its ideals and resources did not disappear and its supporters were active during the interwar period and after both in Europe and the United States. As a proof of the vitality of this late – or second generation – pictorialist schools appeared at the time in countries that had previously had little or no involvement in the 1900s movement: Japan, the Czech Republic, Canada, Australia, etc. Although the approach of the photographers from that time evolved taking into account the graphic revolutions of the New Vision, they remained faithful in their endeavour to the aesthetic principles defined originally.

Anchored in the most up-to-date research, this new book – in French – aims at giving a clear and accessible overview of Pictorialism. It deals with the movement in its different aspects to convey a complete and detailed vision to the reader. It considers:

• The main photographers who associated their names with this movement;
• The different countries that took part in this collective adventure;
• The multiple printing processes specific to Pictorialism and that made its aesthetics famous (pigment prints, of course, but also other printing techniques, together with the autochrome and photogravure);
• A time-span longer than the one usually examined in order to include interwar Pictorialism, long forgotten in photographic studies.

Representative and emblematic photographs have been chosen for each selected photographer. Alongside the key figures are less prominent artists to emphasise the fact that Pictorialism was not only adopted by a few men and women whose names remain well-known today, but seduced numerous amateurs with various ambitions and careers, some of whom still wait to be rediscovered and studied.

Features of the book

Reflecting the broadness of the subject, this Photo Poche volume - the 181st in the series - is a double issue (248 pages) gathering 125 photographs by 77 photographers from 15 countries. Photographers are represented by either one, three or five photographs.

The text gathers:

• An introductory essay presenting Pictorialism, its history, characteristics and stakes;
• A record for each photographer, giving key information to understand their work;
• Appendices consisting of:
  • a glossary of technical processes;
  • a bibliography of the most important pictorialist publications;
  • a bibliography of modern studies on the subject.

Moreover, all the works reproduced are precisely captioned, dated and identified, as to their technical process.

List of photographers

Germany: Rudolf Dührkoop, Georg Einbeck, Hugo Erfurth, Wilhelm von Gloeden, Theodor et Oscar Hofmeister, Baron A. de Meyer, Nicola Perscheid, Otto Scharf ; Australia: John Kauffmann ; Austria: Hugo Henneberg, Heinrich Kühn, Hans Watzek ; Belgium: Émile Chavepeyer, Gustave Marissiaux, Léonard Misonne, Émile Rombaut ; Canada: Harold Mortimer-Lamb ; Spain: Antoni Arissa, Antoni Campañà Bandranas, José Ortiz Echagüe ; United-States: Paul L. Anderson, Zaida Ben-Yusuf, Anne Brigman, Alvin L. Coburn, William E. Dassonville, F. Holland Day, Rudolf Eickemeyer, Frank Eugene, Adolf Fassbender, Paul B. Haviland, Gertrude Käsebier, George H. Seeley, Edward J. Steichen, Alfred Stieglitz, Karl F. Struss, Clarence H. White ; France: George Besson, Fernand Bignon, Maurice Bucquet, Mme A. Deglane, Robert Demachy, Pierre Dubreuil, Alfred Fauvarque-Omez, Alphonse Gibory, André Hachette, Céline Laguarde, René Le Bègue, Charles Lhermitte, René Michau, Antonin Personnaz, Constant Puyo ; Great-Britain: James Craig Annan, Malcolm Arbuthnot, Mme G. A. Barton, Walter Benington, Will et Carine Cadby, George Davison, Frederick H. Evans, Alfred Horsley Hinton, Charles Job, J. Dudley Johnston, Alex Keighley, James McKissack, F. J. Mortimer, J. C. Warburg ; Italy: Mario Caffaratti, Domenico Riccardo Peretti-Griva, Guido Rey ; Japan: Ōri Umesaka ; Netherlands: Henri Berssenbrugge, Bernard F. Eilers, John Vanderpant ; Czech Republic: František Drtikol, Drahomír Josef Růžička, Anton Josef Trčka ; Russia: Alexis Mazourine ; Switzerland: Fred Boissonnas

La photographie pictorialiste
Julien Faure-Conorton
Collection « Photo Poche », Actes Sud, 2025
248 pages, 19,50€
ISBN: 9782330120108
Order here

Images: top: Constant Puyo, Éventail, 1900, héliogravure (L’Art photographique, 1900), Collection Raphaël Debilly,Paris; left: F. Holland Day, Achille, 1903, platine, Library of Congress, Prints & Photographs Division [LC-DIG-cns-00168]

Museum Dialogues was initiated as a 12-month research networking project aiming to transcend the disciplinary boundaries of art history, visual culture, photography, new media, museum and curating studies and bridge theory and practice. Bringing together academic researchers and practitioners, the programme has supported the exchange of innovative solutions, inquiries, and practical challenges relating to the exhibition, collection, and interpretation of photography. During 2024, three workshops were held on Zoom, as well as an international conference held in Sunderland, UK and online. 

You can read reflective articles about the workshops and conference, and view new videos and digital murals on the website www.museumdialogues.co.uk 

We're in conversation with independent archivist and educator Cassia Clarke as she introduces her new book Preserving the Familial Archive, facilitated by writer, playwright, artist/curator and scholar Michael McMillan. Preserving the Familial Archive is Cassia Clarke’s debut publication, offering practical, sustainable, and cost-effective strategies for preserving printed photographic archives in your home. Covering everything from fact-finding, handling, packaging, storage, making tough choices, and the emotional complexities of preservation. Cassia also shares personal anecdotes from her own preservation journey, making the process both relatable and insightful.

Cassia Clarke is an independent community archivist and artist educator whose work focuses on acquiring, critiquing, reconstructing, and sharing knowledge, with an emphasis on compassionate conservation and person-centred facilitation. Cassia prioritises learning as a form of freedom and enjoyment. 

Michael McMillan, Arts.D. is a British born writer, playwright, artist/curator and scholar to parents from St Vincent & the Grenadines, who is best known for the much-loved and critically acclaimed The Front Room installation that has been iterated nationally and internationally. His interdisciplinary practice centres around the praxis (theory and practice) of ‘the creative process, ethnography, oral histories, material culture and performativity’.

Preserving the Familial Archive
6 August 2025 at 1830 (BST), £5
London Archives, 40 Northampton Road, London, EC1R 0HB
Booking here

A new photography exhibition Then and Now: London’s transport in photographs opens on Monday 23 June at London Transport Museum in Covent Garden to mark the 25th anniversary of Transport for London (TfL). The new photographic display explores how public transport in London has evolved amid social change. Visitors will be able to compare scenes from the capital’s past with the present day, revealing the major influence transport infrastructure has had on the city’s development. 

The exhibition features 40 striking photographs, bringing together historical images from the Museum’s collection – some dating back to the 19th century – alongside newly commissioned contemporary images by photographer and TfL Train Driver, Anne Maningas.To mark the 25th anniversary of TfL, London Transport Museum commissioned Maningas to document public transport in the city today. Her new images are responses to highlights from the Museum’s collection.   

Anne Maningas is a self-taught, internationally published photographer whose work explores the themes of journeys, being in transit and public transport. Her unique perspective is influenced by her role as a Train Driver at TfL, where she brings a deep understanding of the city’s transport network to her work. As part of her collaboration with London Transport Museum on this exhibition, Maningas was loaned a vintage Bronica medium format film camera from the 1990s – previously used by a Museum photographer and curator. A passionate analogue photographer, Maningas uses traditional film and mechanical cameras to create evocative images that reflect the rhythm of urban life. All the contemporary images featured in the exhibition were produced using analogue processes, highlighting her commitment to traditional photographic techniques.  

Photographer and TfL Train Driver, Anne Maningas said: ‘As someone who works within the transport network, it was a privilege to document it from a different angle. These photos are my way of showing the quiet beauty in the movement of the city. Being able to use analogue film for this project added a sense of continuity with our transport heritage, and it was especially meaningful to shoot with a vintage film camera once used by a London Transport Museum photographer.’  

Matt Brosnan, Head Curator at London Transport Museum said: ‘Photography has played a vital role in documenting the lives of Londoners as they travel across the city and its transport workers as they keep our capital moving. Our striking archive images bring to life London’s rich history and transport past. That’s why we commissioned Anne Maningas to create a contemporary response to standout images from our historic collection. These images reveal not only how the city has changed, but also how transport continues to shape the lives of Londoners every day.’  

Emma Strain, Transport for London’s Customer Director said: 'Seeing how London's transport network has developed from the past to where it is today, through this photography exhibition from one of our train drivers, is really impactful. Anne Maningas’ photographs help to show how integral transport is to the daily lives of Londoners and visitors and how transport services are continually improving. The transformation of London’s transport network since TfL formed 25 years ago is something we're immensely proud of and we encourage everyone to visit the Transport Museum to see this fantastic exhibition.' 

The Then and now: London’s transport in photographs exhibition will run until Spring 2026. For more information visit Then and now: London's transport in photographs   London Transport Museum's permanent photography gallery, where the Then and Now exhibition will be displayed, was made possible thanks to a grant from the DCMS/Wolfson Museums and Galleries Improvement Fund.  

Entry to the Then and Now exhibition is included with Museum admission. Adult tickets to visit London Transport Museum in Covent Garden include free return day-time entry for a whole year, and kids go free! To book visit: ltmusuem.co.uk   

Images: top: : Bus on Oxford Street at twilight, by Topical Press, 1935. Copyright London Transport Museum Collection; left: Interchange concourse at Piccadilly Circus Underground station, by Anne Maningas, 2025. Copyright London Transport Museum Collection. 

Leading Rosebury's Fine and Decorative auction on 10 July is a lot 142 a rare deluxe copy - one of twenty-five - of Emerson and Goodall's Life and Landscape on the Norfolk Broads (1886). The volume was part of a total limited edition of 200, with the twenty-five deluxe copies containing forty platinum prints mounted on India paper, bound in vellum and other enhanced printing. The lot is estimated at £30,000-50,000 with a starting bid of £20,000. 

Eslewhere is a portrait of Winston Churchill, signed and from the estate of his valet, by Edward Steichen. It is estimated at £1000-1500, with a starting bid of £700. 

Fine and Decorative
Rosebury's, London, 10 July 2025
Emerson, lot 142 - see here

Join the Brian May Archive of Stereoscopy at 1.30 p.m. BST (GMT+1) at the Church of St. Mary-le-Strand on Saturday June 21st for a special 3-D talk by photo historian Denis Pellerin. Just a few steps away from King’s College, London, where Charles Wheatstone was professor of experimental philosophy from 1834 to his death, discover the wonders of one of Wheatstone’s most ingenious inventions, the Stereoscope, on a large screen and in glorious 3-D.

Wheatstone presented his device to the Royal Society of London on 21 June 1838, which is why the date was chosen as International Stereoscopy Day. As it also happens to be World Music Day and since Wheatstone was also a musical instrument maker and an inventor of musical instruments, why not come and celebrate with us Charles Wheatstone, Music and Stereoscopy with Victorian – and more recent – images, most of which from the Brian May Archive of Stereoscopy.

The Victorians were very fond of music (bear in mind there were no radios, televisions, record players or smartphones then to enjoy your favourite tunes) and it transpires in the number of stereoscopic images featuring street performers, home concerts and large orchestras.

If you're looking for somewhere 'cool' to hang out tomorrow, please join us. Entrance is FREE and registration can be found here: https://stereoscopyday.wordpress.com/musicmusiciansinperson/

If you miss registration and still want to join us in London, please come to the church and say you're from the British Photographic History Blog, or ask for Rebecca.

If you're unable to join us in London, a similar talk will also take place online later the same day, starting at 6.30pm BST. Please see here for details and registration.

Great image caption/keywording detail in this collection! above shows: Romy Schneider and Harry Meyen strolling along Straße des 17. Juni in Berlin-Tiergarten, in front of the Victory Column and toward the Brandenburg Gate, in late April 1965. Both are elegantly dressed, Schneider wearing a coat and gloves, Meyen a suit and sunglasses. Schneider laughs heartily as they walk side by side across the sidewalk.

Just posting this from my daily photo licensing industry news site Photo Archive News for interest to researchers: 

German based photo library United Archives has acquired the Sven Simon Photo Archive which includes many unseen photographs of the Federal Republic era – commonly known as West Germany from 1949 to 1990.

Photographer Axel Springer Jr., better known as Sven Simon, was the most significant photographer of the Federal Republic of Germany and left behind an extraordinary photographic legacy despite his early death – one that captures the history of West Germany as vividly as few others.

United Archives is now making images accessible that have so far received little public attention: both iconic and previously unknown motifs, intimate insights into the lives of celebrities, quiet observations of historic events—a multifaceted and ambivalent view of the Federal Republic.

Details and link to images here on PAN

I absolutely adore these Peter Mitchell 1970s colour photographs made from Hasselblad two and a quarter square negatives. There is something so …. well, British about them.

The wit, the humour (pigeons sitting outside the racing pigeon shop), the stiff upper lip, the carry on regardless, the working class pantomime of life and death – the public commission flats where people formed caring communities that were destroyed through redevelopment – the integrity of an existence that has largely come and gone pictured with warmth and empathy.

The people, growing up during the Second World War the privations of which lasted well into the 1950s, now during a period of change in the 1970s standing behind the fish ‘n chip counter wondering where their lives had gone and how they had got there, but still with that British sense of spirit and grit.

Peter Mitchell, “a chaser of a disappearing world” pictures these “goners” – buildings, people (and a way of life) near the end of existence soon to be demolished – in an almost painterly manner.

His use of colour, perspective and form is very fine. Witness, the flow of the photograph ‘Edna, George & Pat, H.E. Greenwood Butcher, Waterloo Road, Leeds, 1977’ (below) as, in the shot, the camera allows the eye to pan from one vanishing point at left to the other at right, with the patchwork of colours and panels of the building creating an almost Mondrian-like texture – blue to black to beige to white sign to pale blue to yellow to green to pale green, surmounted by the dark blue of the threatening sky highlighting the jagged form of the building. Superb.

My favourite photograph in the posting is The Chair, Priestly House Interior, Quarry Hill Flats, Leeds, 1978 (below). This photograph is from what I believe to be Mitchell’s strongest body of work on the demolition of the Quarry Hill Flats in Leeds. ‘One of those doomed deserts was Quarry Hill flats, irresistible both as a symbol of the fate of all architecture and of the great clock in the heavens signalling everybody’s life span’ (Peter Mitchell quoted on The Guardian website)

A drab, beige, wallpapered room with double aspect window, an art deco chair with mirror reflecting nothing, an electrical socket, a ceiling light sprouting malignant plant and trapped in the window panes, little birds fluttering against their capture, trapped forever inside an abandoned flat, this abandoned life.

Yes, there’s a sense of nostalgia and melancholy in these photographs but their restrained, formal, representation of life does much to ennoble the people and buildings contained within them which, through osmosis, ennobles the mind of the viewer.

As I myself sense the great clock in the heavens signalling my life span, the pleasure and comfort I get from feeling the spirit of Peter Mitchell’s photographs is immeasurable.

Dr Marcus Bunyan

 Main Image: 

Peter Mitchell (British, b. 1943)
Edna, George & Pat, H.E. Greenwood Butcher, Waterloo Road, Leeds, 1977
1977
C-print
© Peter Mitchell

Peter Mitchell (British, b. 1943)
The Chair, Priestly House Interior, Quarry Hill Flats, Leeds, 1978
1978
C-print
© Peter Mitchell

SEE THE FULL POSTING AT https://artblart.com/2025/06/13/exhibition-peter-mitchell-nothing-lasts-forever-at-the-photographers-gallery-london/

The programme and registration for this student-led conference is now open. Photographs are mobile and malleable. They travel between people and places, change appearance and form, and traverse through different settings and environments. In image-led societies, photographs are often disrupted or removed from their original contexts to be repurposed by governments, institutions and researchers, as well as by artists, communities, campaigners, and many others.  How, and to what ends, are these photographs being repurposed, and by whom? How does repurposing photographic materials impact social, cultural, and political phenomena? This conference aims to facilitate discussions on the reuse, recirculation, and transformation of photographs, and explore the ways in which they have been re-employed in both the contemporary and historical contexts. 

‘Repurposing Photographic Materials’ is a student-led hybrid conference on photography and visual culture, funded by Midlands4Cities through the Arts and Humanities Research Council. It provides a platform for speakers and audience members to share their ideas, receive constructive feedback, and establish valuable networks. The event is open to anyone interested in the conference’s research topics, including students, academics, artists, and practitioners. Updates will be posted to the website and to the social media pages.

The programme: 

Day 1: Monday 7th July 2025

Panel 1: Repurposing Historical Photographic Practices and Processes (Chair: Jo Gane)

09:30 - 09:35 Panel 1 Opening (Jo Gane)
09:35 - 09:50 Jo Gane (Birmingham City University) Repurposing historical photographic processes: Re-creation
09:50 - 10:05 Martin Jürgens (De Montfort University) Repurposing in the 1840s? The case of multiplying the unique daguerreotype
10:05 - 10:20 Aindreas Scholz (Technical University Dublin) Reactivating Cyanotype: Repurposing 19th-Century Photographic Practices for Ecological Resistance
10:20 - 10:50 Panel 1 Q&A
10:50 - 11:05 Break

Panel 2: Photographic Interventions in Political Struggles and Transformations (Chair: Javed Sultan)

11:05 - 11:10 Panel 2 Opening (Javed Sultan)
11:10 - 11:25 V. Emmanuel Leon Bobadilla (University of Oxford) The affordances of photographic annotations: thinking through 'The Class' by Marcelo Brodsky
11:25 - 11:40 Emma Colombi (University for Foreigners of Perugia) Recovering the Past. The Contemporary Reuse and Re-signification of Italy’s 1968–1977 Protest Photography
11:40 - 11:55 Vincent Hasselbach (University College London) আওয়াজ উডা – কথা ক/ awaaz utha – kotha ko: potential histories and anticipated futures in the visual and material cultures of the 2024 monsoon revolution
11:55 - 12:10 Kateryna Volochniuk (University of St Andrews) Operational Images and Industrial Discipline: The Case of Soviet Photo-Accusations
12:10 - 12:40 Panel 2 Q&A

Panel 3: Reimagining Archival Photography in Contemporary Practice (Chair: Emma Hyde)

13:40 - 13:45 Panel 3 Opening (Emma Hyde)
13:45 - 14:00 Kamal Badhey (University of Brighton) Building Regional and Transnational Contexts with the Family Albums of the Apna Heritage Archive
14:00 - 14:15 Emma Hyde (De Montfort University) Digitisation as Repurposing: Photographs in the Age of a “Digital Revolution”
14:15 - 14:30 Daniel Rathbone (University of Warwick) Remembering Places: The People’s Parks Archive Project and Photographic Histories in South Africa
14:30 - 15:00 Panel 3 Q&A

Day 2: Tuesday 8th July 2025

Panel 4: Participatory Photography and Constructing Identity (Chair: Victoria Shaw)

09:30 - 09:35 Panel 4 Opening (Victoria Shaw)
09:35 - 09:50 Huw Alden Davies (University of West England Bristol) Collective Identity Through Community Portraiture
09:50 - 10:05 Molly Caenwyn Warren (University of Westminster) Repurposing the (Queer) Home in the (Home) Darkroom
10:05 - 10:20 Philip Waterworth (Sheffield Hallam University) The disabled flaneur: Using a method of collage to map and negotiate disability and assemble memories of place
10:20 - 10:50 Panel 4 Q&A
10:50 - 11:05 Break

Panel 5: Photographic Transformations in Social and Cultural Heritage (Chair: Daniel Rathbone)

11:05 - 11:10 Panel 5 Opening (Daniel Rathbone)
11:10 - 11:25 Madeleine Bonham Jones (Birkbeck, University of London) The Golden Age of the Ocean Liner: Postcards of RMS Aquitania and the Corporate Image
11:25 - 11:40 Devon McCulloch (University of Brighton) Alien Registration: The Passport Photo, Bureaucratic Procedures Past and Present
11:40 - 11:55 Alfisha Sabri (University of Warwick) Framing Imperial Fantasies: A Historical Study of Mussoorie’s Photographs and their Nostalgic Present
11:55 - 12:10 So Yin Tam (University of Oxford) Co-authorship in Focus: Contractual Metafiction in Conceptual Photography, 1970s–1980s
12:10 - 12:40 Panel 5 Q&A
12:40 - 13:40 Lunch

Panel 6: Photographic Representations and Re-presentations of Community Memories (Chair: Caroline Fucci)

13:40 - 13:45 Panel 6 Opening (Caroline Fucci)
13:45 - 14:00 Caroline Fucci (University of Leicester) Looking at the Big Picture: Archive, Narrative, and History in Biennial Exhibitions
14:00 - 14:15 Isabel Collazos Gottret (University of Leicester) Repurposing from within, weaving logic and purpose into the Artecampo Museum Archive
14:15 - 14:30 Emily Patten (University for the Creative Arts) A Lesbian Narrative: The Impact of Dissemination Methods on Tessa Boffin’s Photographic Tableau, The Knight’s Move (1990)
14:30 - 15:00 Panel 6 Q&A

Closing
15:00 - 15:05 Closing talk (Javed Sultan)

Repurposing Photographic Materials
Hybrid, 7-8 July 2025
Regisration is free
Leicester, De Montfort University
Full programme and abstracts here: https://studentphotocon2025.wordpress.com/

Christie's is offering the Yann Maillet collection of daguerreotypes online until 26 June. The collection includes many important daguerreotypes from 1839 including images from such key figures as Samuel Morse, Robert Cornelius, John Ruskin, Platt D. Babbitt, Henry Fitz Jr., Plumbe, Moreau, Durand, Eynard, Plumier, Francis Grice, Bogardus, Helsby, and more than two dozen plates by Southworth & Hawes, representing the process across north and south America and Europe. 

Of particular note to BPH are several daguerreotypes from Beard patentees, three views of Florence by John Ruskin, c.1846, and two views of a half-timbered building which BPH has identified as the Market House, Ledbury, Herefordshire. 

See the auction here

Images: top: lot 82. Unknown photographer(s), Half-timbered building, [Market House, Ledbury, Herefordshire], c.1846;  right: lot 32. John Ruskin (1819-1900), San Miniato al Monte, Florence, c.1846