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Ray Harryhausen collection. A position is available to undertake cataloguing a large collection of artefacts relating to the career of a film special effects animator. This includes paintings and drawings, documents, photographs, animation models and moulds, and equipment. You will also prepare the artefacts for transportation.
Though liaising closely with the Collection’s part-time curator and the NMeM’s Collections Manager (based in Bradford), it is likely that for a considerable part of the time the post-holder will be working alone with the collection in a sensitive home environment. Thus it is essential that you are highly self-motivated and capable of dealing sensitively with personal relationships.

The position is based at Ray Harryhausen's House in London, as part of a NMeM project, and full details (Ref: DOHP/11) can be found here. The closing date for applications is 5th December. Good luck!

Job Type: Full Time - Fixed Term

Salary: £17,909 - £20,841

Benefits: NMSI Enterprise Benefits

Ref: DOHP/11

The Kodak Catalog Project was successfully brought to fruition with over 200 CDs being given away at the PhotoHistory XV Symposium in Rochester two weeks ago.  Another 50 CDs each were given away to the book stores at the two leading Kodak museums in Rochester and Bradford, England. All a gift from Charlie Kamerman of Oregon who produced the CD from his personal catalog collection with additions from collectors around the world.

The Kamerman CD features:
1. 73 different Eastman and Kodak camera catalogs from 1885 (the earliest known) through 1941.
2. A descriptive paragraph or two accompanying each catalog describing the distinctive features of each.
3. A 30 page Introduction detailing the history of Eastman’s catalogs along with some interesting stories about the models who posed for the covers.
4. A 16 page Index including more than 300 cameras and 250 accessories each referenced to the catalogs in which they may be found.

The CD may be obtained for $25 by visiting the George Eastman House bookstore in Rochester or the National Media Museum in Bradford. All proceeds are a donation to the museums. Or you may order one from Charlie Kamerman at
Charlie@kodakcollector.com. The cost is $25 plus shipping. All profits are donated to the museums as noted above. This is the only Kodak Catalogue disk available with the four features noted above.

George Layne - Philadelphia

Auction house Christie's has set a new world record price of $4,338,500 (£2.7 million) for a photograph in an auction in New York. Andreas Gursky's Rhein II was sold on 8 November. The price overtakes the previous record for a Cindy Sherman 1981 print.

The Christie's catalogue entry can be found here: http://tinyurl.com/d7ugw9l

Photograph © Andreas Gursky, Rhein II, 1991. 

To mark Amistice Day today, the Imperial War Museum has uploaded made than 100 previously unseen portraits of those who served in the First World War publically for the first time on Flickr Commons. Taken from the Museum’s ‘Bond of Sacrifice’ which is an archive of photographs collected by the IWM between 1917 and 1920, all of the photos tell a story. The men shown in them fought – and often died – for Britain and the Commonwealth during the First World War.

As part of the First World War Centenary Programme , IWM will continue to upload photographs to Flickr Commons every weekday until August 2014, the 100th anniversary of the outbreak of the First World War.

Some background information is available here, and to view the site, click on the link here.

Behind the contact sheet by Phil Coombes

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/in-pictures-15672930

"The contact sheet is often described as the photographer's sketch book. It is the result of those moments of exploration, moments spent waiting for a scene to develop before the final moment when, 'click', you know you've got the shot in the can. ... "

Sotheby’s in London will be auctioning off some of the earliest photographs ever taken in India, which have been out of public view for more than a century. The collection, part of the library of James Broun-Ramsay, 1st Marquess of Dalhousie, who was the seventh governor-general of India, consists of more than 220 images from India and Burma, taken by Linnaeus Tripe shortly before the first war of independence in 1857.

Mr. Tripe was born in Devonport on the southwest coast of England in 1822. He joined the East India Company in 1839 and shipped off soon after to serve with the 12th Madras native infantry. While he lived to 80, he only took photographs between 1853 and 1870. His first pictures were of ships and the harbor in Devonport, taken when he was back in England on leave in 1853.

Today, Mr. Tripe’s work is part of some of the most important collections in the world, including at the Victoria and Albert Museum in London, The Getty in Los Angeles and the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art.

The auction, which will be held next Tuesday (15th Nov) is estimated to fetch between £340,000 (about $544,000) and £560,000 ($896,000) for the entire set. Details can be found here.

Photo: Chennakesava Temple, Belur will feature as part of Linnaeus Tripe’s “Views of Mysore” (1854) auction collection.

This video was prepared by the Plymouth City Museum and Art Gallery for an exhibition of photography, and includes works by Linnaeus Tripe:

Negative to Positive from PCMAG on Vimeo.

In case any BPH members have not come across this yet, one of the largest online collections of historical photographs of China was launched at the University of Bristol over the summer. The Visualising China project, a unique virtual archive of Chinese life, gives users the opportunity to explore and interact with more than 8,000 digitised photographs of China taken between 1850 and 1950.

The site offers free open access to major online collections such as Historical Photographs of China (University of Bristol), the Sir Robert Hart Collection (Queen’s University, Belfast) and Joseph Needham’s Photographs of Wartime China (Needham Research Institute, Cambridge), as well as to previously unseen and private collections and a selected Google Books library of China-related publications.

Users may submit comments or annotations to the image entries, organise images on to their own workbenches, download low-resolution images, and explore the collections by word searches, date ranges, photographer, people depicted, maps and classification terms.

The Visualising China project grew out of five years of digitisation work undertaken by HPC in the Department of Historical Studies, culminating in one of the largest online collections of historical photographs of China, which is still growing.

Images come from a variety of sources – archival (e.g. School of Oriental and African Studies archive; the National Archives; British Steel Collection), commercial (e.g. John Swire and Sons Ltd), as well as privately-held collections, including family albums, prints and negatives, often somewhat neglected in attics and cupboards. The web site was built by ILRT, with additional support from the British Academy, the Arts and Humanities Research Council, the Worldwide University Network and the University of Bristol.

You can access the site using the link, and the official press release can be found here.

Dear colleagues, friends and prospective applicants,

I’m writing to let you know of two posts which have now been formally advertised by the University for roles within the Department of Special Collections of the University of St Andrews Library in Scotland.

Each post would consist of a four year contract working with the Lawrence Levy Golf Photography Collection which is comprised of over 200,000 35mm slides on the subject of golf from 1978 to 1994. Each post is quite different in nature and grade. The first is a cataloguing and curatorial post focused on access, interpretation and exhibition (expertise in Golf history is essential), whereas the second post is based on scanning, physical preservation, and creating skeleton records in preparation for the Curator.

For complete details about each of these posts please see the following links to the official advertisements on our university’s HR site.

Photographic Golf Collection Project Curator - JC1049

Photographic Golf Collection Digitisation Officer - SB1059

All applicants must be currently eligible to work and live in the UK.

Best wishes to all,

Marc Boulay

Marc Boulay 

Photographic Archivist

Department of Special Collections
Library Annexe
North Haugh
St Andrews
KY16 9WH

T: 01334-462339
E: speccoll@st-andrews.ac.uk
www.st-andrews.ac.uk/library/specialcollections/

Here's the link to the latest edition of our Newsletter.

Join our mailing list to receive it directly and you'll be entered in a draw for £100 to spend at the Fair.

Click here to see Newsletter.

Ruth Wilcock has just published her book "Whitby Photographers, their lives and their photographs from the 1840s" that can be purchased via her website http://towlard.com. It has 218 pages A4 containing over 260 photos and 170 illustrations, many never published before that help tell the story of Whitby’s many photographers. Their story is closely woven in with the history of the town, which is illustrated on their cartes-de-visite and postcards. Many of their stories have never been published before, and for those that have, like Sutcliffe, Watson and Ross, much new information has been discovered, including links with Beatrix Potter. Lewis Carroll pops up like the White Rabbit in Samuel Braithwaite’s studio on several occasions. The history of the Camera Club, founded in 1897, and the later Photographic Society is also told.

Whitby’s resident photographers have included William Stonehouse, Francis Pickernell, Samuel Braithwaite, George Wallis, John Waller, John Harrison Dawson, William Wallace Herbert, James Aston Briggs, William Henry Heming, Edmund Hall, John Tindale, plus many more who worked for shorter periods or even just for a few seasons.

Two photographic “dynasties” are represented in the town’s photographic history - the Seaman family, originally from Chesterfield, who were in town for a few years, and the Doran family, who came to Whitby via London and Peterborough and stayed in business for 85 years. There is a short chapter on photographers of the district, including Henry Charles Morley of Staithes and Joseph Readman of Glaisdale.

Due for release on 2 February 2012 is Professor Elizabeth Edwards' new book: The Camera as Historian: Amateur Photographers and Historical Imagination, 1885-1918 published by Duke University Press. The book's synopsis reads: 

In the late nineteenth century and early twentieth, hundreds of amateur photographers took part in the photographic survey movement in England. They sought to record the material remains of the English past so that it might be preserved for future generations. In The Camera as Historian, the groundbreaking historical and visual anthropologist Elizabeth Edwards works with an archive of nearly 55,000 photographs taken by 1000 photographers, mostly unknown until now. She approaches the survey movement and its social and material practices ethnographically. Considering how the amateur photographers understood the value of their project, Edwards links the surveys to the rise of popular photography, concepts of leisure, and understandings of the local and the national. Her examination of how the photographers negotiated between scientific objectivity and aesthetic responses to the past leads her to argue that the survey movement was as concerned with the conditions of its own modernity and the creation of an archive for an anticipated future as it was nostalgic about the imagined past. Including more than 120 duotone images, The Camera as Historianoffers new perspectives on the forces that shaped Victorian and Edwardian Britain, as well as contemporary debates about cultural identity, nationality, empire, material practices, and art.

About The Author

For more information: http://www.dukeupress.edu/Catalog/ViewProduct.php?productid=17745

I found this and thought it might be of interest. 50 Masters, I will probably go.

If it is worth a look I will let you know.

I have enjoyed the blog and there have been some good posts. 

The Harry Ransom Center seeks a curator to provide leadership and vision for an internationally renowned photography collection with strengths in the history of photography, photojournalism, documentary photography, Texana, and literary iconography.

The Ransom Center is a special collections library and museum at the University of Texas at Austin with over 37 million literary manuscripts, one million rare books, over 5 million photographs, and 100,000 works of art.

Salary: Minimum $75,000 depending on credentials.

Responsibilities: Serve as department head and supervise Research Curator in Photography, Associate Curator of Photography, and Associate Curator of Art, in addition to several support staff; work in association with the Academic Curator of Photography. Plan and prepare major exhibitions devoted to photographic materials, placing them in the context of other Ransom Center collections. Engage with scholars and support research and instruction in the photography collections. Responsible for overall direction of acquisition in photography; build relationships with collection donors, photographers, and dealers.

Benefits: Standard state benefits package including annual vacation and sick leave, paid holidays, and health insurance options. Eligible for Optional Retirement Program (TIAA-CREF and other options). Deferred compensation and supplemental tax-sheltered annuity programs also available. Significant professional travel funding.

Required Qualifications: Master's degree in a field related to the collection. A minimum of five years experience in museums or special collections libraries. Experience curating photographic materials. At least five years supervisory experience.

Preferred Qualifications: Ph.D. in a field related to the collection. Ten or more years experience in museums or special collections libraries. Distinguished record of publications, preferably in the history of photography. Experience curating major exhibitions on photography, creating exhibition catalogs, and exhibition-related public programming. Knowledge of the trade in photographic materials. Extensive experience with development and donor relations. Experience with public relations and marketing of photographic collections.

Nancy Inman and Marlene Nathan Meyerson Curator of Photography
Harry Ransom Center, The University of Texas at Austin

Application procedure: Go to https://utdirect.utexas.edu/apps/hr/jobs/nlogon/111026010606
Applicants must complete the online job application and submit a letter of interest, a current resume, and contact information for three references to: Dr. Richard W. Oram, Associate Director & Librarian, Harry Ransom Center, University of Texas at Austin, PO Box 7219, Austin, TX 78713-7219, roram@mail.utexas.edu. Review of applications begins January 23, 2012 and will continue until position is filled. Security sensitive; conviction verification. EEO/AA.

More than 300 evocative pictures of the past are in a new book by David Kindred called Ipswich: the Changing Face of the Town, which is being published this week. The oldest photographs date from the 1880s.

Other early pictures include high-quality images taken by Harry Walters, who worked in the town from the 1890s to 1926. Most of his photographs chronicle Queen Victoria’s diamond jubilee celebrations in 1897 and show the streets and buildings of Ipswich as they were at the turn of the century.

The publisher is Suffolk-based Old Pond priced at £19.95, and further details can be found here.

Photo: Tavern Street, Ipswich, in 1897, from a point near St Lawrence Lane and looking towards the Cornhill. Hatton Court is to the right

As mentioned in an earlier blog, details are now available of the third instalment of "Another Story: Photography from the Moderna Museet Collection" which has the subtitle Written in Light. It delineates the infancy of photography, from the moment when the Frenchman Louis Jacques Mandé Daguerre developed the photographic process of the daguerreotype in 1839, to August Sander’s fascinating project People of the Twentieth Century, black-and-white portraits of German citizens from the first half of the 20th century.

Across six rooms, several pioneering feats of photography will be presented with unique works that contribute to Moderna Museet’s exceptional position among photography-collecting institutions. The section includes Julia Margaret Cameron, who portrayed famous Brits in the 1860s, revealing both their inner and outer character. Guillaume Berggren’s photographs from 1880s Constantinople are legendary, as are Carleton E. Watkins’ documentation of the American West a few decades earlier. In addition to portraits, landscapes, nature and architecture were typical subjects for the early photographers. A few examples of present-day photography are inter- spersed, for instance Tom Hunter’s series in which he explored the urban landscape in the wake of industrialism around the turn of the millennium.

Details of the exhibition can be found here. And an interview with Daniel Birnbaum, Moderna Museet's director, who took the radical step to rehang the museum’s whole collection, can be read on this link here.

The Observer and Guardian's photography commentator Sean O'Hagan reports on a scaling back of plans for London's Photographers' Gallery and the National Media Museum's Media Space, due to the difficulty of raising funds in the current economic climate. See: http://www.guardian.co.uk/artanddesign/2011/nov/01/london-photographic-spaces-photographers-gallery?newsfeed=true  The Photographers' Gallery budget was scaled back from £15.5 million in 2009 to £8.7 million and Media Space has yet to secure the projected £8.7million it needs and has also changed its vision for the space.

Elsewhere in Britain the re-opening of the Open Eye Gallery in Liverpool is a sign of activity outside of the capital. O'Hagan's weekend piece in the Observer (reported here: http://britishphotohistory.ning.com/profiles/blogs/britain-s-leading-photography-galleries-together) was criticised in the blogosphere for its London-centric perspective, unfair perhaps when his  focus was on four London based curators and their spaces. That said, there is plenty happening outside of London that is equally worthy of celebration.