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Treasures from the world’s oldest surviving photographic society are to go on display in South Kensington, the site of one of the UK’s first ever public exhibitions of photography. Drawn by Light: The Royal Photographic Society Collection  will show at the Science Museum's Media Space gallery from 2 December 2014-1 March 2015 and then at  the National Meidia Museum from 20 March-21 June 2015. It will tour to the Reiss-Engelhorn-Museen, Mannheim, Germany in 2017. 

In 1858, the Royal Photographic Society (RPS) held an open exhibition at The South Kensington Museum, which later became the Science Museum and the Victoria and Albert Museum. Pioneers of photography whose work was exhibited at this first show from Roger Fenton to Lewis Carroll and Hugh Welch Diamond will now be displayed in Media Space alongside remarkable images from some of modern photography’s most influential figures such as Don McCullin, Terry O’Neill and Martin Parr.

This exhibition will also showcase key artefacts from the history of the medium – Nièpce heliographs, Talbot’s camera lucida sketchbook, The Pencil of Nature (the first commercially published book to be illustrated by photographs) and seminal images such as Oscar Rejlander’s The Two Ways of Life.

Founded in 1853, as the Photographic Society, The RPS began making acquisitions following Prince Albert’s suggestion that the society collect photographs to record the rapid technical progress of photography. The society and its membership have developed over time, with its collections now holding some of the greatest examples of photography and photographic equipment and ephemera across all genres and eras.

Now held at the National Media Museum, Bradford as part of the National Photography Collection, the RPS Collection is one of the most important and comprehensive photographic collections in the world, with over 250,000 images, 8,000 items of photographic equipment and 31,000 books, periodicals and documents. It continues to expand today under the management of the National Media Museum, with acquisitions of contemporary work by present members and RPS Award winners.

Co-curated by Colin Harding, Curator of Photography and Photographic Technology at the National Media Museum, and Claude W. Sui, Curator and Stephanie Herrmann, Associate Curator of the Forum of International Photography of the Reiss-Engelhorn-Museen, Mannheim, Germany, this exhibition is the first major London show highlighting the contents of this internationally-renowned collection.

Revealing the stories behind some of the most famous photographers and their photographs, Masters of Light will feature exquisite landscapes, still lives, nudes, portraits, photo-reportage and composites from some of the art’s most important practitioners, from William Henry Fox Talbot to Ansel Adams and Madame Yevonde to Edward Weston.  

Colin Harding, Curator of Photography and Photographic Technology at the National Media Museum, said: ‘The Royal Photographic Society Collection is one of the greatest resources for the study and appreciation of photography anywhere in the world. Working with this collection is daunting but it is also an incredible privilege. The collection reveals how photography has fundamentally shaped our perception of the world and illustrates photography’s enduring power, richness and variety over nearly two hundred years of innovation and creativity.’

Claude W. Sui, Curator and Head of the Forum of International Photography of the Reiss-Engelhorn-Museen, Mannheim, Germany, said: ‘As a curator it is a dream to work with these tremendous items from The Royal Photographic Society Collection. There is a fascinating contrast of well known and unknown treasures by the same photographers all belonging to one of the oldest existing photographic societies, which shows a wide range of different categories from landscape, architecture, portrait, journalism to experimental and artistic approaches. A whole range of photographers are represented, as are all the significant movements from the history of photography; from the beginning of the form to the present, from pictorial photography to the trend for straight photography, the new vision, the new objectivity. Immersing oneself in the depth of this collection is like diving for pearls – it’s an exciting adventure to bring to light the highlights and the hidden treasures.’

Michael Pritchard, Director-General, The Royal Photographic Society commented:  ‘The RPS Collection is one of the world’s outstanding photography collections and The Society is excited that the public in the UK and Germany will have the opportunity to see highlights in two very special exhibitions. There is nothing like seeing original photographs and objects, and those being shown, covering both the art and science of photography from the 1820s to the present day, are amongst the best anywhere.’

Drawn by Light: The Royal Photographic Society Collection is the third major exhibition to open in Media Space and the exhibition is presented in collaboration with the Reiss-Engelhorn-Museen, Mannheim, Germany where the exhibition will go on display in 2017.

Image, top: Rudolf Koppitz, Bewengungsstudie (Movement Study), 1926; centre: Refugees: A Mother and Her Child in Bangladesh, Don McCullin, 1971; below: Eastern Madonna, Walter Bird, 1935 / The Royal Photographic Society Collection © National Media Museum, Bradford / SSPL.

- See more at: http://www.rps.org/news/2014/july/masters-of-light-exhibition#sthash.EJ0sxYJq.dpuf

UPDATED: originally published 9 July,  the exhibition now has a new title and is called: Drawn by Light: The Royal Photographic Society Collection. (see: http://www.sciencemuseum.org.uk/visitmuseum/Plan_your_visit/exhibitions/drawn_by_light) 

In the first major exhibition of photographs by Captain Linnaeus Tripe (1822–1902), some 60 works will include early pictures he took in England as well as the outstanding body of work he produced in India and Burma (now Myanmar) in the 1850s. The exhibition has been co-curated by Professor Emeritus Roger Taylor.

Introduced to photography by those who saw it as a pastime, he recognized that it could be an effective tool for conveying information about unknown cultures. Under the auspices of the East India Company, he took many photographs of archaeological sites and monuments, ancient and contemporary religious and secular buildings, as well as geological formations and landscape vistas not seen before in the West. His military training gave his work a striking aesthetic and formal rigor and helped him achieve remarkably consistent results, despite the challenges that India’s heat and humidity posed to photographic chemistry.

Organized by the National Gallery of Art, Washington, and The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, in association with the Victoria and Albert Museum, London, it opens in Washing DC on 21 September 2014-4 January 2015; then travels to The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, 24 February-25 May, 2015 and Victoria & Albert Museum, London, 23 June–11 October, 2015.#

Image: Linnaeus Tripe, Madura: The Vygay River with Causeway, across to Madura, January–February 1858, albumen print, National Gallery of Art, Washington, The Carolyn Brody Fund and Horace W. Goldsmith Foundation through Robert and Joyce Menschel

Tate Britain is to hold the first exhibition in Britain devoted to salted paper prints, one of the earliest forms of photograph. A uniquely British invention, unveiled by William Henry Fox Talbot in 1839, salt prints spread across the globe, creating a new visual language of the modern moment.

This revolutionary technique transformed subjects from still lifes, portraits, landscapes and scenes of daily life into images with their own specific aesthetic; a soft, luxurious effect particular to this photographic process. 

The few salt prints that survive make brief appearances on the gallery wall due to their fragility, and so this exhibition, a collaboration with the Wilson Centre for Photography, is a singular opportunity to see the rarest and best early photographs of this type in the world.

Tate Britain, 24 February–7 June 2015. 

See: http://www.tate.org.uk/whats-on/tate-britain/exhibition/salt-and-silver-early-photography-1840-1860

Image: Jean Baptiste Frenet, Horse and Groom 1855. © Wilson Centre for Photography.

Online registration for Archives 2.0: Saving the Past, Anticipating the Future, a major conference taking place at the National Media Museum, Bradford, on 25-26 November 2014 is now open. This international conference examines the challenges and opportunities around the acquisition and management of archives by cultural institutions.

The original call for papers was made here: http://britishphotohistory.ning.com/profiles/blogs/cfp-archives-2-0-saving-the-past-anticipating-the-future-25-26-no

Register here: http://www.nationalmediamuseum.org.uk/Collection/ArchivesConference

Photohistorians Dr Brian May CBE and Denis Pellerin are presenting an exclusive lecture on behalf of The Royal Photographic Society. May and Pellerin have researched the little known connections between Victorian art and stereo-photography.  For the first time they examine the art behind many popular stereocards of the time.  The lecture accompanies the publication of a new book The Poor Man’s Picture Gallery and a display at Tate Britain. 

Brian and Denis will be signing copies of the book after the lecture. Copies will be available for purchase.  

The Poor Man’s Picture Gallery, is a 208-page book, the second to be published under the imprint of the London Stereoscopic Company, and comes with Dr Brian May’s specially designed Owl stereo-viewer. 

The six-month exhibition at Tate Britain, London, runs from 13 October 2014 to 12 April 2015 where twelve paintings from the Tate collections will be displayed side by side with the stereo-photographs they inspired. Stereoscopic cabinets, also designed by Dr May, will make it possible for visitors to experience 3D viewing the Victorian way and to compare the three dimensional rendition of the painting with its original version hanging on the wall.

See more and book tickets at: http://www.rps.org/events/2014/october/09/the-poor-mans-picture-gallery

The RIBA announces an international symposium on architectural photography in conjunction with the first major retrospective of the British architectural photographer Edwin Smith (1912-1971), whose prolific work helped redefine the notion of post-WWII Britishness.

The symposium will take place on 13-14 November at RIBA in London.

The symposium will honour the legacy of Robert Elwall (1953-2012), an acclaimed British historian of architectural photography and curator, since 1976, of the RIBA's Photographs Collection that now bears his name. With some million and a half architectural images, the Robert Elwall Photographs Collection is one of the most extensive resources for the study of the influence of photography on architecture and the creative process.

For more information and to book tickets - early bird tickets are currently available - visit: http://www.architecture.com/WhatsOn/November2014/BuildingWithLightTheLegacyOfRobertElwall.aspx

Image: Sherborne School Dorset, 1960. © Edwin Smith / RIBA Library Photographs Collection

In this pre-internet, pre-television, pre-cinema, and pre-radio time known as the Victorian age, there were  only a limited number of ways for middle class people to have access to pictures or art. They could stop outside a printseller’s shop to look at the prints and lithographs displayed there, buy one of the numerous illustrated magazines that had started to be published from the 1830s, or visit the yearly Royal Academy Exhibitions and some of the recently opened public galleries.

Though photography had been revealed to the world only two years after Queen Victoria came to the throne, over a decade would elapse before the influence of the new medium could be felt outside of portraiture. Things began to change after 1851 when the wet collodion process invented by Frederick Scott Archer and the development of the albumen paper enabled photographers to produce multiple prints at a much lower cost and therefore to reach a wider clientele. Around the same period, the previously dormant stereoscope which, by means of two flat, slightly dissimilar pictures, gave the viewer the illusion of depth, became the latest craze. Avid spectators could suddenly discover the whole wide world in its three dimensions without leaving their parlour or fireside thanks to the efforts of stereophotographers operating farther and farther away from home By 1859 they were offering views of Europe, Egypt, and even Japan and China.

The stereoscope was also particularly well suited for viewing statuary. Amateurs could own all the best ancient and modern sculptures in the world in a space no bigger than a shoe-box and gaze at them leisurely, without being disturbed by other visitors or wardens.

It would have appeared that the flat surface of the painted canvas, the engraving or the woodcut was way beyond the scope of the stereoscopic artists but that would have been counting without the latter’s resourcefulness. A number of stereo-photographers who specialised in narrative scenes, started re-staging in their studios several of the most popular paintings, illustrations and cartoons of the time. Some of their works were faithful copies of the originals, others were only inspired by them, but all of them ended up as stereocards in the bourgeois parlours and constituted what became known as “the poor man’s picture gallery.”

Photo historians Dr. Brian May and Denis Pellerin have researched these little known connections between Victorian high or popular art and stereophotography. They are publishing a fully illustrated book which, under the title The Poor Man’s Picture Gallery, examines for the very first time the sources of inspirations of several photographic artists of the era. The 208 page book, the second to be published under the imprint of the London Stereoscopic Company, comes with Dr Brian May’s specially designed Owl viewer allowing readers to discover the images in glorious 3D.

This work accompanies a six-month exhibition that was put up by Tate curator Carol Jacobi and that will be held at Tate Britain, London, from October 2014 to April 2015. Twelve paintings from the Tate collections will be displayed side by side with the stereophotographs they inspired. Stereoscopic cabinets, also designed, by Dr May, will make it possible for visitors to experience 3D viewing the Victorian way and to compare the three dimensional rendition of the painting with its original version hanging on the wall. Artists such as Henry Wallis, Philip Calderon, Sir John Everett Millais, Charles Landseer, Charles Leslie, William Collins, and many others, both English and foreign, had their works revisited for the stereoscope. It appears however that, in a few cases, it was the pictures made for the “magical instrument” that provided the artist with a source of inspiration for his work. The book also reveals that a fair number of stereocards were the inspiration for popular china figures bought or won as prizes at fairs and consequently known as “fairings.”

Exhibition: Tate Britain - October 2014-April 2015

Book: published 9 October 

Public lecture and book signing: 9 October for the Royal Photographic Society at RIBA, London. Tickets: www.rps.org/stereo. 

Symposium: 4 November. The other speakers are Lynda Nead, from Birkbeck College, London, Lindsay Smith, from the University of Sussex, Elizabeth Edwards, from De Montfort University, Leicester, John Plunkett, from the University of Exeter,  Patrizia di Bello, from Birkbeck College, London, and Kelley Wilder, from De Montfort University, Leicester.

Using real magic lantern projectors as used during the First World War poet and broadcaster Ian McMillan and photographer and artist Ian Beesley tell a story of the First World War from the point of view of men who survived it and lived on to old age and a changing world. They also tell the tales of women who worked in the factories that oiled the wheels of war.

The show reminds us that war is made by people who each have their own narrative of what happened.

Tour dates:

September
25th Accrington Library 8pm
26th Harris Library & Museum 8pm

October
8th Wirral Book Festival 7pm
10th The Rope Walk Barton On Humber 730pm

November!
19th Gilling East Village Hall 730pm
20th Potto Village Hall 8pm
21st Settle Village Hall 730pm

Details: http://www.uktouring.org.uk/ian-mcmillan/ or www.ianbeesley.com

Photograph: Ian Beesley

Renowned curator of photography Kate Bush is joining the Science Museum Group as Head of Photography.

She will lead an ambitious programme of photography exhibitions for Media Space at the Science Museum and the National Media Museum and the development of a major touring programme that brings the world-class National Photography Collection to a wider national and international audience.

Kate takes up the newly created role on 28 July. She was previously Head of Art Galleries at the Barbican Centre.

The announcement was made by Ian Blatchford, Director of the Science Museum Group, who said: “In luring Kate to our group of museums, we are uniting the most inspiring advocate for photography I’ve met with one of the greatest photography collections in the world. Media Space has made an excellent start in raising the profile of the National Photography Collection; the next step is to ensure our exhibitions become an integral part of the top league touring circuit.”

Building on the momentum of last year’s launch of Media Space, the new role will include forging strong relationships throughout the international photography community and securing key temporary exhibitions for the two museums in London and Bradford. It will also oversee an active acquisitions plan.

Kate Bush’s successes at the Barbican included Everything Was Moving: Photography from the 60s and 70s, which was shortlisted for Exhibition/Curator of the Year in the Lucie Awards for Photography, Los Angeles. She was also Chair of the judging panel for the 2014 Kraszna Krauz Foundation Book Awards and has judged several major prizes including the Turner Prize and the Hasselblad Award.

She said: “I am thrilled to be joining a museum with such an exciting and energetic vision for the future. This is a once-in-a lifetime opportunity to create a world-class programme of photography exhibitions in the beautiful new galleries in London, as well as Bradford and internationally. I can see tremendous scope in this role to develop new audiences and new approaches to the exhibition and study of photography. It’s an extraordinary collection which demands to be better known and I am looking forward to working with the teams to achieve that.”

Recent and upcoming photography highlights for the Science Museum Group include:

• Joan Fontcuberta: Stranger Than Fiction opens in Media Space on 23 July and runs until 9 November, featuring six conceptually independent narratives which mix fact with fiction and science with art. It will then open in Bradford on 19^th November.
• The inaugural Media Space exhibition, Only in England: Photographs by Tony Ray-Jones and Martin Parr, was critically-acclaimed and welcomed 43,968 visitors in London before a successful run in Bradford which ended on 29 June.
• Following the launch in Bradford on 30 January, the Science Museum will become the fourth venue within the Science Museum Group to host Open for Business, from 22 August – 2 November 2014. The story of British manufacturing and industry is told through the lens of nine Magnum photographers.
• Masters of Light: Treasures from the Royal Photographic Society will open in Media Space on 2 December.

Comprising of approximately 3.2 million images, the National Photography Collection includes work by Julia Margaret Cameron, Alfred Stieglitz, Edward Steichen, Edward Weston, Paul Strand, Dorothea Lang, Ansel Adams, Henri Cartier-Bresson, Larry Burrows, Martin Parr, Paul Graham, Nick Knight and Luc Delahaye amongst others.

Image: © Jennie Hills / Science Museum

Curator, Kate Bush, who was at the Barbican, London for eight years is joining the National Media Museum and Media Space as Head of Photography. In addition to her overall role she will have particular responsibility for acquisitions and touring exhibitions. The announcement was made by Jo Quinton-Tulloch, Director of the National Media Museum, at an exhibition opening last night.

Bush left her post of Head of Art Galleries at the Barbican in September 2013 'to develop a range of independent curatorial projects for galleries in the UK and internationally.' At the Barbican she curated the well regarding exhibition Everything Was Moving: Photography from the 60s and 70s (2012-13). 

Her roles include Head of Art Galleries, Barbican (2005-2013); Head of Programming at The Photographers’ Gallery (1997-2004); Editorial Director (Art and Photography) at Phaidon Press; and Deputy Director of Exhibitions at the ICA, London (1992-1997). She curated the major anthology exhibition, In the Face of History: European Photographers in the 20th Century (2005). Bush has judged a number of international prizes including: the Turner Prize (Tate, London), the Hasselblad Award (the Hasselblad Foundation, Gothenburg), the Deutsche Borse Prize, and the Future Generation Prize (Viktor Pinchuk Foundation, Kiev).

Bush acted as judge for the Source-Cord prize see: http://source.ie/sourcephoto/?p=2556 and Source's website carries an interview with her.

Art Everywhere is the largest outdoor exhibition with 30,000 poster sites and billboards up and down the country celebrating a summer of art by showing 25 artists' work.  Artists, curators, media owners and entrepreneurs joined by a love of art have fuelled this massive charitable celebration.

Amongst the pictures being shown from 21 July-31 August 2014 will be Julia Margaret Cameron's Iago which dates from 1867. The original is from the Herschel album, now in the National Media Museum Collection. Colin Ford was responsible for leading the campaign to save the album from export in 1975 (see: http://www.artfund.org/what-we-do/art-weve-helped-buy/artwork/4087/the-herschel-album-julia-margaret-cameron). 

If you spot Iago on a billboard or advertising hoarding please send BPH a picture of it in situ. 

Leading artists Grayson Perry and Antony Gormley today announced the works which have been chosen by the British public for the UK’s biggest art exhibition, Art Everywhere which will take place on over 30,000 billboards and outdoor sites across the country from 21 July-31 August 2014. 

Over 38,000 votes were received via Facebook (facebook.com/arteverywhereuk) in the process to select the nation’s favourite works which will be shown on bus shelters, underground stations, roadside billboards, motorway services, national rail networks, shopping centres and airports across the UK. 90% of the population will have an opportunity to see a work of art at an outdoor site during the summer. The art will also be shown in a national Art Everywhere on-screen exhibition shown in over 1,000 Vue cinema screens in the UK in August.

See:http://arteverywhere.org.uk/

Image: Julia Margaret Cameron, lago (Study from an Italian), 1867, © National Media Museum / Science & Society Picture Library

'Living Dangerously' - The Terence Spencer Photographic Exhibition is the first such show at the newly launched £10m Shrewsbury Museum & Art Gallery in the heart of the town's historic centre. The Museum is based in the former Music Hall which was the town's principal entertainment venue from 1840 to 2009 and saw many musical acts including The Beatles in 1962/3. Now the Fab Four are back with some beautiful images taken by Terence Spencer when he followed the band around for four months in 1963.

Terence Spencer's work covers wars in Vietnam and the Congo, personalities such as Princess Grace, filmstars like Ava Gardner, John Mills, Richard Chamberlain, Rex Harrison and politicians such as Edward Heath, Tony Benn and Margaret Thatcher.

Terry's photos are supplemented by those of other rock photographers such as Jill Furmanovsky which have been kindly loaned by Rockarchive and feature Oasis, John Lennon and Yoko Ono, Paul McCartney and George Martin, Pink Floyd, David Bowie, Jimi Hedrix and Amy Winehouse.

The Exhibition was launched on Friday 18th July by his daughter Cara who lives near Shrewsbury and is the custodian of her late father's extensive archive. Photos are licensed via Camera Press and more information about the archive can be found at http://terencespencerphotoarchive.net

The exhibition is in the main gallery on the first floor which has large windows giving excellent views of The Square and the 1596 Old Market Hall, now a cinema and cafe bar.

The Museum & Art Gallery is in the heart of Shrewsbury's medieval town centre and tells the history of the town from its Roman origins at Wroxeter through The Industrial Revoloution to modern manufacturing.

Admission to the whole Museum & Art Gallery including the Exhibition costs £4 for adults and £2 for children.

www.shrewsburymuseum.org.uk

An exhibition of photography by war hero Terence Spencer is now open at the new Shrewsbury Museum & Art Gallery this summer until 31st August. With two audacious careers, first as a World War II fighter pilot and later as a celebrated photo-journalist for American magazine LIFE; ‘Living Dangerously’ will showcase the work Terry did to capture momentous events from the swinging sixties and the rise of The Beatles to the horror of conflicts in the Congo, Vietnam and Northern Ireland.

The exhibition has been curated by Terry’s eldest daughter, Cara Spencer, who was left a remarkable photo archive of over one million negatives when her father passed away in 2009. Commenting on the new exhibition, Cara says:

“Dad led quite a life. He was a combination of Biggles and James Bond all rolled into one. The show will tell the story of his remarkable life, as well as the lives of those he captured so poignantly on film. We’ll have black and white reportage photographs and huge colour images, as well as memorabilia from his time in the RAF. I’m looking forward to sharing the iconic works and hidden gems of dad’s collection with visitors to the museum”.

There will also be pictures from Rockarchive, featuring Terry Spencer’s photos of stars including Marianne Faithfull, Robert Plant, Oasis, The Police and The Smiths. Rockarchive’s founder Jill Furmanovsky says:

“Terry Spencer was a great friend to Rockarchive and contributed a collection of marvellous images, including Robert Plant striding through the woods of Herefordshire, John, Paul, George and Ringo in various settings and Bob Dylan at the Isle of Wight in his famous white suit”.

Tina Woodward, Shropshire Council deputy Cabinet member for visitor economy, said:

“The collection is simply amazing and I’m really proud to see such high quality exhibitions coming to the new Museum & Art Gallery. The wide variety of subjects in the collection means there is something for everyone to delve into.”

Run by Shropshire Council, the new Shrewsbury Museum & Art Gallery opened in April 2014 as the result of a major restoration project on the town’s old Music Hall, where The Beatles performed on two separate occasions in 1962/3. The ‘Living Dangerously’ collection of photographs, which takes its name from Terry and his wife Lesley’s joint autobiography, will be housed in the Special Exhibitions Gallery overlooking The Square and Old Market Hall.

The exhibition ‘Living Dangerously’ will run 19 July – 31 August. Shrewsbury Museum & Art Gallery is open 10am – 5pm, seven days a week. Admission is £4.00 per adult and £2.00 per child, which includes entry to the Special Exhibitions Gallery. Concessions are available. For more information visit www.shrewsburymuseum.org.uk

The Archives and Cultural Industries conference which takes place in Girona, Spain, from 13-15 October has a reduced early bird registration until 31 July. 

Find the registration form here:

http://www.girona.cat/web/ica2014/cat/inscripcions.php 

Prices include attendance at sessions, 6 coffee breaks, 3 lunches and the Conference dinner (the latter is not included in the “Student” fee).

Programme:

http://www.girona.cat/web/ica2014/eng/programa.php

Keynote Speakers:

http://www.girona.cat/web/ica2014/eng/ponents_fontcuberta.php

Workshops:

http://www.girona.cat/web/ica2014/cat/workshops.php  

BPH has learnt that Violet Hamilton, who worked closely with Michael G Wilson OBE in developing his collection of photography has died suddenly. Violet, an Australian by birth but a long term UK resident,  was a Senior Curator of the Wilson Centre for Photography, London, and a photographer in her own right, exhibiting her work. She lectured, was a researcher, historian and writer with a specialist knowledge on nineteenth century women photographers, in particular of the work of Julia Margaret Cameron. She wrote the text to Annals of My Glass House (1998) which used Cameron's photographs and contributed to many other publications or supported others in their research. 

Her funeral will take place on Thursday 17 July at 11am at Grantham Crematorium, Harrowby Road, Grantham. Lincolnshire, NG31 9DT with a gathering afterwards at Ellys Manor House, her and Clive's home.

No flowers, but donations may be made to: The Leaveners via the Funeral Director, Robert Holland, 14 St Catherine's Road, Grantham. Lincolnshire. NG31 6TS, tel: 01476 594422

Snowdon has given 130 original prints of some of his most iconic photographs to the National Portrait Gallery, London. Several of them will be shown at the gallery for the first time in an important display this autumn.

Coinciding with a new monograph published by Rizzoli, Snowdon: A Life in View (26 Sep 2014-21 Jun 2015), will highlight studio portraits from the 1950s to the 1990s, alongside selections from Private View Snowdon’s important 1965 examination of the British art world created in collaboration with art critic John Russell and Bryan Robertson, then director of the Whitechapel Art Gallery.

Curated from a major gift to the Gallery in 2013, in close consultation with the photographer’s daughter Frances von Hofmannsthal, the display includes over 40 black-and-white portraits taken throughout his expansive and influential career.

When he started photographing in the early 1950s Snowdon focused on theatre, fashion, and society subjects, and began a six-decade career with British Vogue. In 1960, he married Princess Margaret, the sister of Queen Elizabeth II, in the first globally televised royal wedding. In the early 1960s Snowdon worked with The Sunday Times Magazine on a range of documentary subjects from mental health to loneliness.

Since then Snowdon has photographed a vast range of cultural figures and the display includes portraits of actors such as Maggie Smith, John Hurt, Alan Bates, Julie Christie and Laurence Olivier, writers such as Nell Dunn, Agatha Christie, Kingsley Amis, Elizabeth Jane Howard and Graham Greene and musicians and dancers such as Yehudi Menuhin, George Melly, Anthony Dowell and Margot Fonteyn. Figures from the art world include Anthony Blunt, Henry Moore and Barbara Hepworth, William Coldstream, Kenneth Clarke and John Piper. A selection of portraits of the Royal Family from the 1950s is also included.

Sandy Nairne, Director of the National Portrait Gallery, London, says: ‘The National Portrait Gallery is delighted that Lord Snowdon should have made such a generous further gift of prints to the collection. These are wonderful portrait images of some most creative and engaging contributors to Britain in the second half of the 20th century.

This display which is curated by Helen Trompeteler, the National Portrait Gallery’s Assistant Curator of Photographs, will celebrate the major gift of Snowdon photographs acquired in 2013. The Snowdon archive website: http://www.snowdon-review.com

Snowdon: A Life in View, National Portrait Gallery, 26 Sep 2014-21 Jun 2015, admission free. www.npg.org.uk. Room 37 and 37a, Ground Floor Lerner Contemporary Galleries

Image: David Bowie by Snowdon, 1978

- See more at: http://www.rps.org/news/2014/july/snowdon-npg-donation#sthash.BKJ3E0WJ.dpuf

I thought it appropriate to notify you of my exhibition of memorial/postmortem photographs- Memorializing Infant Loss in 19th Century Photography. The exhibit is being shown at a conference at the University of Hertfordshire and opens July 16th.  The conference title is Perceptions of  Pregnancy…

The photograph and Australia is the story of the interactions between people and country, and their representations in photography. The exhibition explores how photography operates aesthetically, technically, politically, and in terms of distribution and proliferation, in the Australian context. The arrival of photography in the 1840s parallels the development of the colonies and relationships with Indigenous Australians. Importantly, the photographs sent to World expositions in the 19th century present an evolving image of the nation. Indeed, in this exhibition, 19th century photography is seen as the foundational wellspring of this country.

Taking a thematic rather than chronological approach, The photograph and Australia looks at how the photograph images people and place in wonderful and marvellous ways. Clusters of photographs highlight the dialogue between photographer and subject, the construction of place, exploration, depictions of family and personal relationships, the interactions between settler and Indigene, as well as the distribution, collecting and classifying of images.

The dialogue between art, photography and scientific endeavours is crucial, as is the relationship, played out in photographs, between self and nation. The dynamic exchanges between the professional studio or amateur photographer and their subjects, and distributor and collector, are explored. These are, in part, built on the technological evolution of the medium, which has enabled such exceptional reach and constant adaptation that within the space of 175 years the image has become as pervasive and powerful as the written word.

The exhibition consists of work by photographers such as George Goodman, Thomas Bock, Richard Daintree, William Hetzer, Thomas Glaister, Louisa How, Frederick Kruger, CA Woolley, Charles Bayliss, JW Lindt, Paul Foeslche, Baldwin Spencer, Frank Hurley, Melvin Vaniman, Harold Cazneaux, RC Strangman, Frances Perrin, Olive Cotton, Max Dupain, Sue Ford, Mervyn Bishop, Carol Jerrems, Ricky Maynard, Anne Ferran, Robyn Stacey, Patrick Pound and Rosemary Laing. Their photographs are shown alongside the work of unknown photographers and vernacular material such as cartes de visite, mug shots and domestic albums. The selection of works and structure of The photograph and Australia will enable a reassessment of the construction of people and place, identity and culture through the tantalising medium of photography. More than 35 lenders, 400 photographs and more than 120 artists from 1845 until now

The exhibition will be accompanied by a substantial publication. The book will reflect the themes and much of the content of the exhibition but is intended as a stand-alone title which has a life beyond the exhibition. The book will be authored by Judy Annear, senior curator photographs at AGNSW, with a concluding essay by Geoffrey Batchen and focus essays by specialist writers, Michael Aird, Martyn Jolly, Jane Lydon, Daniel Palmer, Kathleen Davidson.

The book will examine the sense of wonder which the photograph can still induce for its ability to capture both things of the world and those of the imagination, and how Australia itself has been shaped by photography.

The exhibition will run from 21 March to 7 June 2015 at the Art Gallery of NSW, Sydney, Australia. See: http://www.artgallery.nsw.gov.au/

Frankfurt's Städel Museum is claiming to be the first art museum in the world to have exhibited photographic works. The first mention of a photo exhibition at the Städel Museum dates from 1845, when the Frankfurt Intelligenz Blatt – the official city bulletin – ran an advertisement. The museum is claiming this is the earliest known announcement of a photography show in an art museum worldwide.

The 1845 exhibition featured portraits by the photographer Sigismund Gerothwohl of Frankfurt, the proprietor of one of the city’s first photo studios who has meanwhile all but fallen into oblivion. Like many other institutions at the time, the Städel Museum had a study collection which also included photographs: then Städel director Johann David Passavant began collecting photos for the museum in the 1850s. In addition to reproductions of artworks, the photographic holdings comprised genre scenes, landscapes and cityscapes by such well-known pioneers in the medium as Maxime Du Camp, Wilhelm Hammerschmidt, Carl Friedrich Mylius or Giorgio Sommer. An 1852 exhibition showcasing views of Venice launched a tradition of presentations of photographic works from the Städel’s own collection.

The museum is now marking the 175th anniversary of the announcement of the invention of photography with a new photography exhibition. The special exhibition dealing with European photo art – Lichtbilder. Photography at the Städel Museum from the Beginnings to 1960 – presents the photographic holdings of the museum’s Modern Art Department, which have recently undergone significant expansion.

From 9 July to 5 October 2014, in addition to such pioneers as Nadar, Gustave Le Gray, Roger Fenton and Julia Margaret Cameron, the show will feature photography heroes of the twentieth century such as August Sander, Albert Renger-Patzsch, Man Ray, Dora Maar or Otto Steinert, while highlighting virtually forgotten members of the profession. While giving an overview of the Städel’s early photographic holdings and the acquisitions of the past years, the exhibition will also shed light on the history of the medium from its beginnings to 1960.

See more at: http://www.staedelmuseum.de/sm/index.php?StoryID=1924&websiteLang=en#sthash.xaUUWzZM.dpuf

Image: Giorgio Sommer (1834–1914), Naples: Delousing, ca. 1870.

Bonhams is to sell the Leica camera with which Russian photographer Yevgeni Khaldei took Raising a Flag over the Reichstag, one of the most famous photographs of World War II. It is being offered at Bonhams Leica Centenary Sale in Hong Kong on 30 November and is estimated at £230,000-340,000 ($HK 3,000,000-4.500,000).

The image of Russian troops hoisting the Hammer and Sickle above the Reichstag (the German Parliament building) in May 1945 enjoyed instant popularity.  It became one of the most widely reproduced war photographs in the world and is often compared to the famous image of American soldiers raising the Stars and Stripes at Iwo Jima.

The Russians saw the Reichstag as a symbol of the Nazi regime and placed great store by its capture (although, ironically, the Nazis themselves loathed the Reichstag because of the democratic system it embodied and abandoned the building after it was partially destroyed by fire in 1933).  Khaldei’s image was taken on 2 May 1945 shortly after the Reichstag had finally fallen.  It is a restaging of the moment when Red Army fighters had first flown the flag over the building two days earlier before the Germans fought back and dislodged them.  The soldiers in Khaldei’s photograph are not the original men and the image has been altered to add more smoke - suggesting that fighting was still taking place – and to edit out the looted watches on the soldiers’ wrists.

Yevgeni Khaldei started work as a photo journalist for the official Soviet news agency TASS in the mid 1923s but was dismissed in 1948 for ‘resting on his laurels’ though  Khaldei himself attributed his sacking to anti Semitism. He only became known in the West in the 1990s after the fall of communism. His reputation rests mainly on his wartime work and the photographs he took at the Nuremburg Trials of Nazi war criminals in 1946.  He used this Leica camera for much of his career including his documentation  - rifle in hand - of the Red Army’s drive from 1943 onwards to push the Germans out of Russia which culminated in the fall of Berlin. 

Bonhams  Head of scientific instruments Jon Baddeley said, “It is a great privilege to be selling a  camera with such evocative associations. Raising a Flag over the Reichstag is a defining image of victory over evil which affected people deeply at the time and has continued to resonate for later generations.”