Blogs

In 1839, just two years after Victoria became queen of Great Britain and Ireland, the medium of photography was announced to the world. This exhibition explores the relationship between the new art and the young queen, whose passion for collecting photographs began in the 1840s and whose photographic image became synonymous with an entire age. With important loans from The Royal Collection shown alongside masterpieces from the Getty Museum, the exhibition displays rare daguerreotypes, private portraits of the Royal Family, and a selection of prints by early masters such as William Henry Fox Talbot, Roger Fenton, and Julia Margaret Cameron.

The exhibition is being held at The Getty Centre, Los Angeles from 4th Feb to 8th June 2014. Details can be found here.

January 2014 – Save Photo Limited have discovered what may be the earliest surviving original images of Winston Churchill. They were discovered in the Hills and Saunders Harrow Collection, which they were contracted to digitise, conserve and catalogue for the private owner. The collection was found in poor condition in the dairy barn of a farm outside Cirencester in 2012. The private owner and Save Photo rescued the collection and relocated it to a secure and climate controlled storage at Save Photo’s headquarters in Warwickshire. Save Photo are carefully cleaning, cataloguing, storing and digitising the images for future digital consumers to enjoy.

For over 90 years, between 1860 and 1970, Hills and Saunders, photographers by Royal Appointment, captured memorable images of Harrow schoolboys, their families and the beautiful surrounds of this prestigious institution. This collection, of over 90,000 glass plate negatives, is possibly the largest surviving archive of its kind in the world. The Collection includes every member of staff, pupil and sporting team from Harrow School between 1860 and 1965. Glass plates rarely survive due to their fragile nature and other top public schools are known to have sold off or disposed of their plates.

Lizzie Davies, Save Photo’s archivist, discovered the seven images of Winston Churchill whilst she was matching individual pupils to the photographic plates using the original photographers’ ledgers and documentation.

Seven plates have been discovered that show Winston Churchill aged between 13 and 17, during his four years at Harrow School as part of The Head Master’s House between 1889 and 1892, under House Master Reverend Welldon. Six are from The Head Master’s House ‘Welldon’ group photographs and one photograph features him in the Harrow School Rifle Corp. In The Head Master’s House group photographs Winston Churchill is depicted through his years alternating between unhappiness and contentedness, reflecting the statesman’s varied attitude towards his school years - though he didn’t excel at school, he revisited Harrow many times. One can see his schoolboy maturation during his years at Harrow, moving from the front to the back row. He can also be seen dressed in military garb with the rifle Corp, having joined very early on. One can see a keen alertness in his expression pointing towards his illustrious military career ahead. 

Peter Boswell, Managing Director of Save Photo comments ‘Save Photo Limited has been very privileged to work with such a unique collection of historical significance. Our team have been working on an intensive programme of conservation and archiving. We have been lovingly inspecting each photographic plate to ensure it is carefully cleaned, recorded and stored in high quality archival sleeves. With the First World War centenary events beginning this year, I am delighted that we have been able to add these amazing lost images to the portfolio of known Churchill images’.

The Winston Churchill plates that form part of the Hills and Saunders Harrow Collection will be offered for sale at auction later this year, details to be announced by the Private Owner in due course.

See: www.savephoto.com 

Artistic images of women posing nude for legendary photography pioneer Eadweard Muybridge could soon become a familiar sight along Kingston’s riverside.

The company behind the new Riverside Kingston restaurant development, next to Kingston Bridge, has announced bold plans to commemorate one of the town’s most famous sons by emblazoning its building with stills from his Human Figures in Motion project, carried out in the mid 1880s.

The oversized black and white photographs would greet visitors coming into town from Richmond over Kingston Bridge, as well as those travelling along the Thames.

You can read the rest of the article here.

A key event in the birth of photography is being celebrated with illuminations at the place depicted in one of the first photographic negatives. The lights are part of the second Illuminating Lacock Abbey light festival by the National Trust and marks a year celebrating Fox Talbot's achievements.

Kristine Heuser, from the National Trust,said the theme of the display was "The Window" to celebrate the window at Lacock Abbey depicted in Fox Talbot's photographic negative. The medieval cloisters, the driveway and the exterior of Lacock Abbey will be transformed with colour and light.

Illuminating Lacock Abbey runs from 16:00 to 19:00 GMT every evening until 9 February. You can read more here and here.

Photo taken from BBC website.

The Science Museum is seeking a highly-motivated, enthusiastic and experienced Paper or Photographic conservator to provide conservation support in the development and delivery of exhibitions in our new Media Space Gallery. 

Media Space is an exciting new exhibition space in the Science Museum. It will showcase the National Photography Collection held by the National Media Museum in Bradford through a series of major exhibitions. A collaboration between the Science Museum and the National Media Museum, Media Space will also invite photographers, artists and the creative industries to respond to the wider collections of the Science Museum Group to explore visual media, technology and
science. The first of the major photographic exhibitions opened in September 2013; “Only in England with photographs by Martin Parr and Tony Ray-Jones.

Using your demonstrable experience in conservation of paper items and your excellent communication skills you will be working with the conservator at the National Media Museum to conserve and mount, condition report, pack and unpack, install and decant exhibitions in the 500m² gallery space. There will be two major exhibitions per year, one being installed in April and one in September.

This part time fixed term role will be for approximately 50 days per year (depending on salary) with work centred around the install and decant dates. These dates will be discussed in detail during the interview. Some travel to the National Media Museum will be required. You will need to be aware of hazard management procedures associated with historical objects and have a good knowledge of Health and Safety, including safe use of chemicals for lab safety and collections management.

Working days: This part time role is for approximately 50 days per year centred on the installation and decants dates of the exhibition. The exact dates where you will be required to work will be available in advance and peak times will be September and April.

See: http://www.nationalmuseums.org.uk/media/job-pdfs/job-4167.pdf

I am researching four platinum prints that I believe to be by Reginald W. Craigie. Information on Craigie is sparse on the internet, aside from his connection with the Linked Ring and the Salon I don't know much more about him. This is intriguing because I have identified two of the portraits - one is definitely James McNeill Whistler and the other is Augustus St. Gaudens. I would be grateful for any suggestions. I hope to travel to England later this year to conduct further research.

Yes, this is a self-serving message but possibly of some interest to members of this site. We have long been distracted by various projects, particularly on a book about John Ruskin’s daguerreotypes, but have just added more than 160 new photographs to our web site. We hope there will be images to provoke study and possibly delight even for those among you who are unlikely to purchase. Furthermore, the site has useful information for collectors and researchers of 19^th century photography: links to other web sites; advice to collectors; a bibliography; a suggested system for describing the condition of photographic prints and a glossary of printing processes.

Ken Jacobson

www.jacobsonphoto.com

As reported here previously The Royal Photographic Society has digitised the Photographic Journal / RPS Journal from 1853 to 2012 and made it available free of charge to the public. It is now accessible through the RPS website at www.rps.org/archive

BPH understands that other Society publications including The Year's Photography and published membership lists from 1853-1949 may be made available in a similar way in the future, subject to funding. 

Enquiries by email to: director@rps.org

A new photography exhibit in Rangoon is offering a glimpse of what Burma was like in the 19th century.

Hosted by the Italian Embassy and the Yangon Heritage Trust, a local NGO dedicated to preserving Rangoon’s heritage, the exhibit is showcasing nearly 50 photographs that shed light on architectural styles from over a century ago, as well local fashions, the daily life of various ethnic groups, and the people who lived and worked at royal palaces around the country.

The images were taken by three foreigners who owned photography studios in Burma in the mid- to late 19th century. Most were taken by Italian-British photographer Felice Beato, who owned a studio in Mandalay in 1887 and took a wide array of portraits of people from that era.

The photographs will be displayed until Feb. 28 in the lobby of the Yangon Heritage Trust on Pansodan Street in Rangoon. Details can be found here.

Photography has become the most direct medium for people across the world to understand China since its introduction of photography to the country in the mid-nineteenth century. Owing to the special political circumstances, Hong Kong then became a natural stopover for foreign photographers on their way to the Mainland. These photographers took many pictures on the early development of Hong Kong, while some of them even established studios in Hong Kong specializing in taking portraits and selling scenery pictures of South China. These pictures are all invaluable research materials for studying the history of modern China and the history of photography in China.

The Hong Kong Museum of History has established a sizable collection comprising a great variety of historical artefacts. Among them, the old photo collection with 14,000 prints and other related items is the most significant hoard of the museum. The exhibitions on old photos staged over the past decades were all very well received.

In mid-2012, Moonchu Foundation agreed to loan about 10,000 old photos of China (including those taken in Hong Kong) recently purchased in the United Kingdom together with batches of valuable old China photos acquired through auctions to the Hong Kong Museum of History for exhibition and research purposes. The collection of Monnchu Foundation captures precious historical scenes, covering streets and everyday life, leisure and commercial activities of the city, vividly illustrating the social development of Hong Kong from the mid-nineteenth to the early twentieth century. With this offer, we embarked on the organisation of a mega photo exhibition. In collaboration with the Technological and Higher Education Institute of Hong Kong (THEI), the exhibition will employ advanced technology and creative skills for producing a series of multimedia programmes, in which the scenes of old Hong Kong will be reconstructed through utilizing the old photos offered by Moonchu Foundation and the museum's old photo collection. It will surely give visitors an extraordinary experience of travelling back in time and visiting some scenic spots in old Hong Kong.

Admission is free, and the exhibition runs until 21st April 2014. Details can be found here.

BPH is very excited to have received a copy of A Royal Passion. Queen Victoria and Photography by Anne Lyden and contributions from Sophie Gordon and Jennifer Green-Lewis. The book accompanies the Getty's exhibition of the same name which opens on 4 February at the J Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles. Watch out for a review shortly. 

Los Angeles - After the so-called "Royal Mania" following Prince William and Kate Middleton's wedding, it's hard to open a newspaper or browse the internet without catching a glimpse of the British royal family. Their photographs saturate the international news cycle, fostering a sense of intimacy between the royals and their subjects and powerfully shaping perceptions of the Windsors around the world. But the ubiquity of royal photographs is not a new trend, and it has powerful roots that trace back to the birth of photography and Queen Victoria.

In January 1839, photography was announced to the world. Two years prior, a young Queen Victoria ascended to the throne of Great Britain and Ireland. These two events, while seemingly unrelated, marked the beginnings of a relationship that continued throughout the nineteenth century and helped construct the image of an
entire age.

A Royal Passion (Getty Publications, $50.00, hardcover) explores the connections between photography and the monarchy through Victoria's embrace of the new medium and her portrayal through the lens. Together with Prince Albert, her beloved husband, the Queen amassed one of the earliest collections of photographs, including works by renowned photographers such as Roger Fenton, Gustave Le Gray, and Julia Margaret Cameron. Victoria was also the first British monarch to have her life recorded by the camera: images of her as wife, mother, widow, and empress proliferated around the world at a time when the British Empire spanned the globe.

Including more than 150 color images-several rarely seen before-drawn from the Royal Collection and the J. Paul Getty Museum, this volume accompanies an exhibition of the same name, on view at the J. Paul Getty Museum from February 4 to June 20, 2014.

The Authors Anne M. Lyden is International Photography Curator at the National Galleries of Scotland, Edinburgh, and former associate curator in the Department of Photographs at the J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles. She is curator of the exhibition A Royal Passion: Queen Victoria and Photography and has written about nineteenth-century photography, including The Photographs of Frederick Evans (Getty Publications, 201 0) and Railroad Vision: Photography, Travel, and Perception (Getty Publications, 2003). Sophie Gordon is senior curator of photographs at the Royal Collection, Windsor. Jennifer Green-lewis is associate professor of English literature at George Washington University, Washington, D.C.

Publication Information:
A Royal Passion. Queen Victoria and Photography
Edited by Anne M Lyden
With contributions by Sophie Gordon and Jennifer Green-Lewis
The J. Paul Getty Museum
232 pages, 9 1/2 x 11 1/2 inches
120 color and 43 b/w illustration, 1 map
ISBN 978-1-60606-155-8, hardcover
$50 / £36
Publication Date: February 4, 2014

Wellcome Images has announced that over 100,000 high resolution images including manuscripts, paintings, etchings, early photography and advertisements are now freely available through Wellcome Images. Out of copyright images are being released under the Creative Commons Attribution (CC-BY) licence.

This means that they can be used for commercial or personal purposes, with an acknowledgement of the original source (Wellcome Library, London). All of the images from the Wellcomes historical collections can be used free of charge.

The images can be downloaded in high-resolution directly from the Wellcome Images website for users to freely copy, distribute, edit, manipulate, and build upon as they wish, for personal or commercial use. The images range from ancient medical manuscripts to etchings by artists such as Vincent Van Goghand Francisco Goya.

From a photography perspective the images includes Muybridge, John Thomson, Beato and others. But one word of advice... don't use the 'technique' preset term for 'photography' as most of the photography images appear to have been categorised by process, so use: daguerreotype, collodion and albumen to find photography images.   

The earliest item is an Egyptian prescription on papyrus, and treasures include exquisite medieval illuminated manuscripts and anatomical drawings, from delicate 16th century fugitive sheets, whose hinged paper flaps reveal hidden viscera to Paolo Mascagni’s vibrantly coloured etching of an ‘exploded’ torso.

Other treasures include a beautiful Persian horoscope for the 15th-century prince Iskandar, sharply sketched satires by Rowlandson, Gillray and Cruikshank, as well as photography from  Eadweard Muybridge’s studies of motion. John Thomson’s remarkable nineteenth century portraits from his travels in China can be downloaded, as well a newly added series of photographs of hysteric and epileptic patients at the famousSalpêtrière Hospital

Simon Chaplin, Head of the Wellcome Library, says “Together the collection amounts to a dizzying visual record of centuries of human culture, and our attempts to understand our bodies, minds and health through art and observation. As a strong supporter of open access, we want to make sure these images can be used and enjoyed by anyone without restriction.”

What are the issues raised by the commissioning of new works by a photographic archive? How do these new works alter or activate the existing archival collections; how do they alter understandings of the archive? And what are the considerations for a photographer/artist making work specifically to enter the archive?

The Library of Birmingham Photographic Archive holds over 3.5 million items, ranging from daguerreotypes at the dawn of the medium to works by contemporary practitioners. The most recent additions to the archive are the works produced through Reference Works, Birmingham’s largest photography commission to date. The project saw four artists - Michael Collins, Brian Griffin, Andrew Lacon and Stuart Whipps - commissioned to respond creatively to the move and transition from the 1970s Central Library to the new Library of Birmingham, opened in September 2013.

Using Reference Works as a starting point, this symposium will consider archival commissioning in a broader context, from the perspective of the archivist, the historian, the curator, the photographer, the artist and the art writer. Speakers include Reference Works artists Professor Brian Griffin, Andrew Lacon and Stuart Whipps; Curator and Head of Photographs at the Library of Birmingham Pete James; Creative director, photo historian and lecturer Anne Braybon; Professor of Philosophy and Director, Centre for Fine Art Research, BIAD, BCU Professor Johnny Golding; photographer and Professor of Photography at the University of Brighton Professor Mark Power and artist, critic and art historian Dr Lucy Soutter. Further speakers will be announced shortly.

Building the archive: the Reference Works photography project in context

Friday 28th February 2014

9:30 am – 5:30 pm
Library of Birmingham

Early Bird Until Friday 31^st January
Full Price £25
Concession £20

Standard
Full Price £30
Concession £25

https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/building-the-archive-the-reference-works-photography-project-in-context-tickets-10077180117

In 1851 British amateurs commented on the large daguerreotypes of the Macaire brothers in Le Havre. Until now only one (at BnF) was believed to have survived. On Monday, 27 January, a second one will surface.

Details: http://www.photoceros.com/27-01-2014-presentation-dun-daguerreotype-de-cyrus-macaire-a-rennes/

Auction:http://www.rennesencheres.com/

The Bethlem Archives & Museum in Monks Orchard Road, Beckenham, records the lives and achievements of people experiencing mental health issues and documents the rich history of the institution, which began in 1247, along with its affiliated hospitals. Recognised as Europe’s oldest institution specialising in mental illnesses, it has been known as St Mary Bethlehem, Bethlem Hospital, Bethlehem Hospital and most notoriously, Bedlam.

Its museum is in the running to collaborate with the photographer, known professionally as Rankin, on a project which has its roots in Victorian images in the Museum’s collection. In the mid-19th century, photographer Henry Hering photographed numerous Bethlem patients to try and detect the patients’ mental health conditions through their facial expressions and features. The Museum holds a large collection of these images, showing patients before and after treatment and illustrating the Victorian need for categorization of patients.

The Museum would work with Rankin to create a new permanent collection of portraits. The project would raise awareness of the extent of mental illness, helping to reduce prejudices by showing that it is not always clear from a person’s appearance that they are unwell. Victoria Northwood, Head of Archives & Museum, said: “As we know now, mental illness cannot always be detected in people’s appearances and our project will aim to emphasise this point. Our historic photography collection is strong and it would be wonderful to be able to revisit the medium with a combination of Rankin’s skill and our contemporary values. 

The full report can be found here. You have until 28th January to place your vote for Bethlem Archives and Museum, or any of the other three contenders here.  It's your choice!

The work of Limerick photographer Franz S. Haselbeck is one of the greatest Irish photographic collections, chronicling an exciting period in Irish history. Haselbeck was never fully appreciated during his lifetime (1885–1973), but his granddaughter, Patricia Haselbeck Flynn, recently painstakingly catalogued his archives, some of which are now on display in Limerick City Hall. 
Haselbeck was a photographer in Limerick City from 1912 until his death, in 1973. He cycled all over the city and surrounding countryside photographing important events of the time, including the War of Independence, construction projects, the military, and taking portraits of the locals.  

His work now provides one of the most important and comprehensive views into 20th century Ireland. Spanning six decades of major change, the collection is made up of almost 5,000 surviving images and documents from the early 1900s to the 1960s.

Patricia Haselbeck Flynn inherited the collection in 1990 and, working closely with the Limerick City Museum and Archives (LCMA ), she has insured her grandfather’s archive of work will be preserved. She also penned the book Franz S. Haselbeck’s Ireland and curated an exhibition of his work and equipment, named The Street, in Limerick City. It is the culmination of years of work.

A selection of his photographs can be seen here, and you can read the rest of the article here.

The National Portrait Gallery, London, has appointed Phillip Prodger (right), founding Curator of Photography at the Peabody Essex Museum, Salem, Massachusetts, as Head of Photographs Collection, from 1 June 2014. He has been at the Peabody since 2008. 

Prodger will lead the Gallery’s photographic exhibitions and displays programme and oversee the Gallery’s Collection of more than 250,000 photographs, which spans from the medium’s invention to the present day.

Terence Pepper OBE, Hon FRPS, formerly Curator of Photographs, has a new part-time role, starting January 2014, as the Gallery’s Senior Special Advisor on Photographs, and will be working on special projects with the Exhibitions team until early 2016. Pepper's change of role was reported by BPH in December 2013.

Phillip Prodger, Ph.D (Cantab.) FRSA, was curator of the National Portrait Gallery's acclaimed exhibition Hoppé Portraits: Society, Studio and Street in 2011, and Ansel Adams: From the Mountains to the Sea, which showed at the Royal Museums Greenwich in 2012. He is the author and editor of 17 books and catalogues, including Darwin's Camera, named one of the best art and architecture books of 2009 by the New York Times, and Man Ray | Lee Miller: Partners in Surrealism (2011). In 2013 he was the only curator in the United States to receive a Focus Award, given annually to those making a critical contribution to the promotion, curation, and presentation of photography.

Originally from Margate, Kent, Phillip Prodger has held appointments at the National Gallery of Canada, the Saint Louis Art Museum, and the Cantor Center for Visual Arts at Stanford University. He received a Ph.D. in history of art from the University of Cambridge in 2005. Expert in late nineteenth/early twentieth-century art and photography, he has curated more than 30 exhibitions internationally, including at the Beijing Museum of World Art and the Berlinische Galerie in Germany.

Terence Pepper’s exhibitions at the National Portrait Gallery include those on Howard Coster (1985) and James Abbe (1995), Angus McBean Portraits (2006), Vanity Fair: Portraits (2008), (co-curated with David Friend and winner of the Lucie Award for Exhibition of the Year), Beatles to Bowie: the 60s Exposed (2009) and Man Ray: Portraits (2013- 2014) which toured to the Scottish National Portrait Gallery, Edinburgh (where it was nominated for a Lucie Award) and The State Pushkin Museum of Fine Arts in Moscow.

Pepper joined the National Portrait Gallery as Librarian in October 1975. In 1978, having become Curator of Photographs, he curated and published his first National Portrait Gallery catalogue to mark the centenary of E. O. Hoppé in Camera Portraits by E. O. Hoppé. (He recently co-authored with Prodger the 2011 Hoppé Portraits Catalogue). In 1981 Pepper curated his first major exhibition, Norman Parkinson: 50 Years of Portraits and Fashion.

In 1988 the exhibitions Helmut Newton Portraits and Alice Springs Portraits were followed by research for the first monograph on Lewis Morley: Photographer of the Sixties (1989). A major book written with John Kobal on the MGM photographer Clarence Sinclair Bull: The Man Who Shot Garbo became the template for a further series of successful exhibitions based on the same formula including Horst: Portraits (2001), and Beaton: Portraits (2004). Pepper’s interest in Edwardian photography resulted in High Society: Photographs 1897-1914 and Edwardian Women Photographers. His most visited exhibition, co-curated with Philip Hoare, was Icons of Pop (1999) while his interest in contemporary photographs saw the establishment of the Gallery’s annual Photographic Portrait Prize.

Dr Tarnya Cooper, Chief Curator, National Portrait Gallery, London, says: ‘Terence Pepper has made a remarkable contribution to the Gallery over many decades and has been responsible for a considerable number of important and critically acclaimed exhibitions. During his long period at the Gallery he has also been absolutely instrumental in building our truly outstanding collection of portrait photographs. We are delighted that he will remain at the Gallery in order to continue to share his considerable knowledge and expertise’.

Sandy Nairne, Director of the National Portrait Gallery, London, says: ‘I am very pleased that Phillip Prodger will join the team at the National Portrait Gallery in London, and will be able to lead our important work in photographic portraits, building on the achievements of Terence Pepper in the development of the Collection and in creating outstanding loan exhibitions.’

In the interim period from 1st January to 31st May 2014 the photographs team will be led by the Gallery’s Twentieth Century Curator, Paul Moorhouse.

Additional reporting: Michael Pritchard

A reader has three photographic medals awarded to a Miss M Brightwell in the 1920s by the B.M.T.S.P.S. Does anyone know what the BMTSPS was? The PS presumably stands for Photographic Society. 

David Burder FRPS and Roger Smith will be presenting a replica of what was probably the first camera to be used commercially in England. Wolcott and Johnson’s design was adapted by Johnson and Beard and patented by Beard. The speakers will talk about the project, the making of the camera (made to Beard's patent drawings) and about the daguerreotype process. This is an evening meeting and time will not permit the making of an image but this is an opportunity to see an exceptional camera and learn about the way it was made and used. Places are limited. Promises to be an educational and fun event.

Monday 20 January 2014 at 6.30pm.

Wetherby Preparatory School, Bryanston Square, London, W1H 2EA

Organised by the RPS London DVJ Group jointly with the Historical Group 

Admission £5 (free for RPS Members) Booking essential via RPS website.