Blogs

The Fine Art Society in Edinburgh is currently showing a collaboration, Perdendosi, between the photographer and printmaker Norman McBeath and artist, master potter and author Edmund de Waal.

The title, Perdendosi, is a musical term meaning to gradually die away. The photographs are a study of leaves at the held, drawn-out stage of their metamorphosis, where they are poised on the cusp of decay and eventual disintegration. During this time, they take on extraordinary shapes as they slowly dry, giving each leaf a unique identity and character. They are at a stage when they are leached of all colour, more like parchment than plant, on the edge of crumbling into the ground and vanishing for good. This study takes them up and gives them an attention, so that they are seen in their own right – like a final Act. In this way Perdendosi offers familiar subjects of study, freighted with associations and symbolism, giving each viewer the opportunity to make their own interpretations. 

 Edmund de Waal offers his own train of thought and associations in his accompanying text Twelve Leaves, which he describes as both autobiography and a journal of reading. This is a uniquely personal, oblique and moving text, in which he draws from poets including Proust, Goethe and Celan in exploring his own emotional response, stimulated by living with these extraordinary images. 

‘leaves hold the idea of holding on …

I think that as I get older I realise that this is hard, that

leaves segue into the act of leaving.’

Edmund de Waal, Twelve Leaves, 2021

Perdendosi is produced in a limited edition of twenty-five and presented in a solander box with silver gilt title, signed by both artists.

The photographs in the exhibition can be seen here: https://www.thefineartsociety.com/exhibitions/169-norman-mcbeath-and-edmund-de-waal-perdendosi/

The exhibition runs from 14th January - 18th February, 2022.

The exhibition Rommi Smith: Changing The Story: Photographs Of British Life In Black And White (1917-1962) is showing at the North Wall gallery in Summertown, Oxford. It’s a selection of 34 images from major British photo library TopFoto, curated by writer-in-residence at the archive, Rommi Smith. These photographs show a radial diversity that ‘disrupts ideas of Britishness as solely white’.

‘I open the album and am spellbound; immediately struck that what unites these temporally disparate photographs – these stories of people and places across time and space – is the racial diversity of the protagonists in them. These photos flip the script on Britishness: my history lessons did not look like this.’ Dr Rommi Smith

There is an associated event on the evening of 20 January.

https://www.thenorthwall.com/whats-on/rommi-smith-changing-the-story-photographs-of-british-life-in-black-and-white-1917-1962/

Although this is not strictly photography-related this may be of interest to the BPH readership... 2022 sees the two-hundredth anniversary of the death of William Herschel, a profoundly significant figure in the field of astronomy, but one who made his early living as a musician - as an oboist, violinist, harpsichordist, organist, composer, and impresario. After leaving a military band in his native Hanover for an unsuccessful two-year stint in London (1757-59), Herschel moved to the north of England (1760), where he composed his symphonies and many other works as an itinerant musician in Richmond, Newcastle, Sunderland, Durham, Pontefract, Doncaster, Leeds, and Halifax. In 1766 he accepted an invitation as organist at the new Octagon Chapel in Bath, where he became a mainstay of the musical scene for over fifteen years. In Bath he was joined by other musical family members including his sister Caroline, who assisted William first in musical and then in astronomical duties, ultimately becoming a distinguished astronomer in her own right.

Herschel's astronomical interests and construction of very high-quality telescopes, beginning in 1773, brought him to international and lasting fame when he discovered the planet now called Uranus in 1781. He came to the attention of King George III, who summoned him to Windsor and effectively ended the musical portion of his career, at age 43. For the rest of his life Herschel made numerous groundbreaking contributions: designing large telescopes; mapping the Milky Way system of stars and the Sun's motion in it; cataloguing and classifying thousands of star clusters, nebulae, variable stars, and double stars; proving the effectiveness of gravity outside the solar system; discovering several moons around Saturn and Uranus; discovering infrared radiation (from the Sun); postulating an evolving universe with stars and nebulae that are born, age, and die; estimating the age of the Universe; and arguing that all stars and planets are populated with intelligent beings.

Contemporary academia's separation of music and astronomy across the arts and sciences is something Herschel and other eighteenth-century thinkers would have found hard to understand, given both endeavours proceeded for them on mathematical principles. This symposium takes the bicentenary of his death as a cue to explore new aspects of Herschel's work as composer, instrumentalist, impresario, and astronomer in the intellectual, creative, and cultural contexts of his time. Our symposium will take a wide perspective on astronomy, music, and natural philosophy, including the Herschels' legacy in connections between science and art today.

Papers of 20 minutes are invited on, but are by no means restricted to, the following themes in his musical and astronomical careers:

*       Herschel's aesthetics

*       Herschel and theology

*       Herschel and creativity

*       Eighteenth-century manufacture of scientific and musical devices

*       Herschel's musical and astronomical networks

*       Herschel's musical life (1757-82)

*       Herschel and Yorkshire, Bath, and Windsor (Slough)

*       Herschel and patronage

*       Herschel as a Hanoverian

*       Herschel, the Bath Philosophical Society, and the Royal Society

*       Herschel in the context of late eighteenth-century natural philosophy

*       Herschel's legacy in astronomy, music, and interdisciplinarity

Proposals of no more than 200 words should be sent to Rachel Cowgill (at rachel.cowgill@york.ac.uk<mailto:rachel.cowgill@york.ac.uk>) by 11 February 2022 with the title 'Herschel Bicentenary Symposium proposal', and should include the author's/co-authors' name, affiliation, and email address.

 The symposium will conclude with a public keynote lecture by Professor Tom McLeish FRS (University of York), a panel discussion on Herschel's legacies, and a concert of Herschel's music given as part of the York Festival of Ideas, 11-24 June 2022 (https://yorkfestivalofideas.com/). We are grateful for the support of the Festival in organising these bicentenary events. Further activities celebrating the ways science and music interconnect are planned for 2022, organised by the University of York's Sound, Voices, and Technology research network (SoVoT).

 Programme Committee:

Rachel Cowgill (Department of Music, University of York) Sarah Clemmens Waltz (Conservatory of Music, University of the Pacific) Woodruff T. Sullivan III (University of Washington, Seattle)

'Cosmic Harmonies': A Symposium Celebrating the Life, Science, Music, and Legacy of William Herschel (1738-1822)
University of York (UK), 19 June 2022
Deadline for cfp: 11 February 2022

Tony Richards has published details of this event for those interested in collodion and alternative processes...Once again, Guys Cliffe House and grounds has been booked for what has become an annual event for wet platers in the UK. After several years of various sites around the UK, this central location is easily accessible by the majority.

After a very successful event in 2021 it is hoped that 2022 will welcome back regulars and newcomers to the event.
The weekend starts on Friday 19th August and goes through till the Sunday 21st August. Both the grounds and the exterior of Guys Cliffe House are exclusively reserved for the use of participants.

Though this is primarily a gathering for wet plate collodion workers, I’m hoping that we can expand the creative potential. If you prefer to work on large format film, cyanotype, salt or pinhole then you are most welcome and encouraged. Basically we welcome any level of worker and even if you are a total beginner or more advanced, there is a great deal to be gained from the experience of other workers, and from my experience there is no shortage of sharing of friendly advice.

The UK Wet Plate and Alternative Processes weekend 2022
Guys Cliffe House, Warwick, 19-21 August 2022
Details and book here: 

The Guardian newspaper has reported that long-lost photographs of Birmingham's 1990s rave club scene have been rediscovered after being hidden away for twenty-five years. The photographs were taken by Terence Donovan at the request of his son who was studying at Birmingham University and show the dance and rave club culture at the Que Club in January 1996. Donovan died in November that year.

Ten of the 65 shots will be shown at Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery in April. 

Read more here: https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2022/jan/01/lost-shots-90s-rave-culture-terence-donovan-go-on-show-birmingham-swinging-london

Image: Club-goers at The Que in Birmingham in January 1996. Photograph: Terence Donovan Archive