Following from the stunning Reports by the Juries (1852) sold at Bonhams in June this year (see: http://britishphotohistory.ning.com/profiles/blogs/reports-by-the-juries-brings) another Commissioners' set in being offered by the same auction house on 22 November 2011. This new set was presented to Philip Pusey. Pusey was a politician and agriculturalist and served as a juror for the class of Agricultural and Horticultural Implements. Details of the lot which is estimated at £80,000-100,000 can be found here: http://www.bonhams.com/cgi-bin/public.sh/WService=wslive_pub/pubweb/publicSite.r?screen=LotDetailsNoFlash&iSaleNo=18992&iSaleItemNo=5157017
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As mentioned in an earlier blog here, dates of this new exhibition to be held at the Natural History Museum has now been released. "Scott's Last Expedition" will explore the captivating story of Captain Robert Falcon Scott's last expedition to Antarctica in 1910-1913, the Terra Nova. This groundbreaking exhibition will also be commemorating the centenary of the expedition and celebrates its achievements. It reunites for the first time real artefacts used by Scott and his team together with scientific specimens collected on the 1910–1913 expedition. Visitors can also walk around a life-size stylised representation of Scott’s base-camp hut that still survives in Antarctica.
To accompany the exhibition, a new book entitled "The Lost Photographs of Captain Scott" has just been published. Most of the photographs taken by Scott during the Terra Nova expedition in the book have not been seen before. A handful were published shortly after Scott’s death, but most of the 120 surviving images have never been published. The once-lost images are accompanied by text from Polar historian Dr David M Wilson, great-nephew of Dr Edward Wilson, who died with Scott and his fellow explorers in 1912.
The series of breathtaking photos capture panoramas of the continent, superb depictions of mountains and formations of ice and snow, and portraits of the explorers on the polar trail. Scott was trained by Herbert Ponting, the official expedition photographer, who had his own dark room in Scott's hut. Some of Scott's photographs will feature in this forthcoming exhibition.
Details of the exhibition can be found here, and you can purchase the book through the Amazon link on the right. Looks like another one for the diary!
On a different note: A case of whisky buried beneath a hut used by the explorer Ernest Shackleton during his unsuccessful 1907 to 1909 expedition to reach the South Pole has been returned to Scotland. The Scotch spent more than 100 years buried in the Antarctic before 5 cases were dug up and carefully thawed by museum officials in New Zealand. One of these cases - of Mackinlay whisky - has been flown to Scotland by the billionaire owner of the Glasgow-based Distillers Whyte and Mackay, on his private jet. It will spend up to six weeks in full laboratory conditions and subjected to analysis before reporting back to the Antarctic Heritage Trust. The bottles are to be eventually returned to Shackleton's hut, unlikely to ever leave the ice again.
That's what I call vintage!
Photo: Taken by Captain Scott of the Terra Nova team with their ponies. This is one of many unseen photos revealed in David M Wilson's new book, The Lost Photographs of Captain Scott. Some of the photos will also be on display at Scott's Last Expedition at the Natural History Museum, Jan 2012. © Richard Kossow
A highlight of a forthcoming Paris sale early next month is a handwritten document from 1829, signed Niépce, titled Notice sur l’Héliographie. Lot 53 can be yours for an estimated €35,000-50,000. The eight highly legible pages, written in an elegant yet precise style, are of major interest for the history of photography and, in fact, are said to constitute the ‘birth certificate’ of photography.
Or how about a cheaper Lot 23 of Daguerre's document on the history and description of the daguerreotype 1839 for an estimated €1,500-2,000.
With Christmas just round the corner, you can pick both up at this auction link here.
Image: Niepce's 1829 signed, handwritten document.
The V&A Photography Gallery opened this evening. The display and room was every bit as good as the exclusive BPH photographs showed (see:http://britishphotohistory.ning.com/profiles/blogs/exclusive-the-new-v-a-photography-gallery-opening-tuesday-25th-oc. Shown here is the V&A Director opening the gallery with Curators Martin Barnes and Marta Weiss to his side.
The gallery opens to the public Tuesday morning. Make a date and visit - you won't be disappointed.
The Projection Box was set up by Mo Heard and Stephen Herbert in 1994, to publish books about pre-cinema and early film, and we gradually included further subjects such as fairgrounds and photography. The Projection Box has been slumbering for a while as we pursued other projects, but is now awake again with new publications and fresh editions of old favourites that have long been out of print.
To celebrate the 2012 Charles Dickens Bicentenary, this month sees publication of The Dickens Daguerreotype Portraits by Stephen Herbert - a new colour monograph. The Kinora, moving pictures for the home 1896-1914 by Barry Anthony returns in a new edition, combined with an original Kinora catalogue reprint. The True History of The Ghost by Professor Pepper, has also been republished.
Other new titles are in the works, so be sure to check the website every month. Some of our new books are being made available by the wonders of Print-on-Demand, made possible by Blurb.com - and may be ordered direct from the printer. Details on our website: http://easyweb.easynet.co.uk/~s-herbert/ProjectionBox.htm
The National Media Museum is about to make several important additions to its Collection and will be rearranging Insight: Collections & Research Centre to make space for them. As a result, access to the Museum’s collections will be disrupted. Insight will be closed to researchers from Monday 27 October 2011, and there will be no tours from 14 November onwards. Insight will reopen on 16 January 2012. Requests for information and future access can be lodged via email: research@nationalmediamuseum.org.uk.
A photo exhibition depicting Victorian life including rare images of Custs path, the predecessor to the Marine Drive, Llandudno's first pier which was badly damaged in the great storm of 1859, North Shore pre-Grand hotel, and many more has been organised by the Llandudno and Colwyn Bay History Society.
Entitled "Victorian Photographs and Souvenirs of Llandudno”, it includes images by Thomas Edge (1829-1900) who settled in the town after being employed by the London Stereoscopic Company to picture parts of Britain. There is also a photo taken in 1860 of William Lot (1841-1919), one of Llandudno’s first postmen, who erected a periscope on a hill above the Happy Valley. He entertained paying guests in his "magic" shed with living panoramas of the town and bay below. A moving image of Llandudno life was cast on to a circular screen in the building via a lens and mirror mounted on the roof.
Details of the exhibition can be found here.
Photo: The Mostyn family were the main landowners and chief architects behind the resort's development and also feature in the exhibition created from a collection by John Lawson-Reay, vice chair of Llandudno and Colwyn Bay History Society.
BPH has secured photographs of the new V&A Photography Gallery which opens to the public on Tuesday, 25 October 2011. A private view takes place on Monday evening. The Gallery has been installed in a former textile room and the building has been returned to its nineteenth century glory - with wall paintings uncovered and restored.
Installation images of the V&A’s Photographs Gallery © Peter Kelleher, V&A Images.
Charlotte Cotton is creative director of Media Space (a partnership between the National Media Museum and the Science Museum). Previously, she was curator of photographs at the V&A, head of programming at The Photographers’ Gallery, and head of the Wallis Annenburg Department of Photography at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. She is the author ofThe Photograph as Contemporary Art and founder of Words Without Pictures.
She will be talking as part of the ICA's Bloomberg New Contemporaries 2011: In the Presence. Join curators, artists, critics and other cultural practitioners on a tour through work in the exhibition, each tour offers a unique perspective on emergent art practice and the state of cultural production in the UK today.
See: http://www.ica.org.uk/?lid=30943 to book.
In Whittlesey, Cambridgeshire, a man covered from head to toe in straw – the ‘straw bear’ – is paraded through the streets, accompanied by 250 dancers, musicians and performers, while in Ottery St Mary, Devon, a crowd gathers as townspeople hoist barrels of flaming tar on to their shoulders and carry them until they are too hot to handle. Photographer Sara Hannant has travelled the length and breadth of the country, capturing the seemingly bizarre regional rituals – costumed processions, symbolic dramatizations, traditional dances and fire ceremonies – that mark the changing seasons and celebrate nature’s bounty. Many of these customs claim an ancient origin, and are kept alive today by local communities. Hannant’s vibrant images reflect her keen eye for the unexpected, offering a captivating and surprising glimpse of contemporary ‘Merrie England’.
To pay the ultimate tribute to a photographer, lecturer and judge, friends at Oxford Photographic Society has produced a book of 140 stunning photographs including stills, portraits and manipulated images (using filters and materials including orange peel, tissue paper, glass and sandpaper!). All the images in the book were taken from slides made by Peter Upton before the advent of digital cameras and computer software.
Mr Upton was a Fellow of the Royal Photographic Society, and a member of its national council and the executive committee of its creative photography group who sadly passed away last year, aged 75. He was recognised for his work, including an award from the Federation of International Artistic Photographers, and his work has been shown worldwide and he often spoke at UK camera clubs and judged competitions.
The full news article can be found here, and to order a copy of the book, which costs £28, call Mrs Upton on 01869 242491.
Photo: Mr Peter Upton
If you found this blog regarding Birmingham and it's role in the history of photography of interest, then you might be keen to attend a talk given by Pete James, Head of Photographs, in a forthcoming evening seminar. He will be speaking on some of the more obscure and less well-known photographs from the internationally acclaimed photographic collection of the Birmingham Central Library.
Birmingham Central Library holds one of the UK’s national collections of photography. Totalling some 3.5 million images, these internationally significant collections include work by some of the UK's greatest photographers: Francis Frith, Francis Bedford, Roger Fenton, Edward Muybridge, Sir Benjamin Stone, Bill Brandt, Tony Ray Jones, Paul Hill, John Blakemore, Brian Griffin Peter Marlow and Chris Steele Perkins amongst others. The collection also includes a vast number images ranging from the less well-known to the downright bizarre.
In 2013 the photography collections will move into the Library of Birmingham where new facilities, including state-of-the-art gallery space, will open up full public access to these collections for the first time - something to look forward to!
Details of this seminar can be found here.
The archive of the Photographic Alliance of Great Britain which contains photographs and documents has been lodged with Birmingham Central Library and David Moore is working with the staff there to catalogue it. The PAGB archive has recently been joined by the donation by the Surrey Photographic Association of the collections of the defunct Central Association of Photographic Societies which includes the F J Mortimer Collection of prints. This will now form part of the PAGB Archive although it will be catalogued separately. Mortimer's personal archive is in private hands.
Once the catalogue has been prepared the PAGB will establish procedures for accessing and adding to the Archive.
Just a reminder that on Tuesday, 25 October 2011, the V&A’s new Photographs Gallery will open to the public. The gallery will have an inaugural display of works by key figures of photographic history including Victorian portraits by Julia Margaret Cameron and significant works by Henri Cartier-Bresson, Man Ray, Afred Stieglitz, Diane Arbus and Irving Penn.
The Photographs Gallery will draw upon the V&A’s internationally renowned collection of photographs, and will chronicle the history of photography from 1839 up to the 1960s. In 1858, the V&A became the first museum to exhibit photographs, and the new Photographs Gallery is able to showcase some of the most technically brilliant and artistically accomplished photographs in its collection. Temporary displays, primarily showcasing contemporary photography, will be shown in the V&A’s existing photographs gallery.
Other highlights include the oldest photograph in the V&A collection, a daguerreotype from 1839 of Parliament Street from Trafalgar Square, a seascape from 1856 by Gustave Le Gray, and a portrait by Robert Howlett of Isambard Kingdom Brunel, taken in 1857. Displays will change every 18 months.
And it's free entry!
Photo: Robert Howlett (1830-58), 'Isambard Kingdom Brunel and the Launching Chains of 'The Great Eastern'', 1857. Museum no. PH.246-1979
The Royal Photographic Society reports that John Chittock OBE FRPS has died. John was a long-standing member of The Society joining in 1955 and gaining his Associateship in 1961 and Fellowship in 1966, remaining a member until his death.
Born on 29 May 1928, John Dudley Chittock's career started as an editor at Focal Press, the leading imprint on books devoted to photography, film and television. Subsequently he became a producer, writer and director of sponsored documentary films with over 30 productions to his credit. His work as industrial columnist on the Financial Times from 1963 to 1987 gradually took over.
With his late wife Joy he founded the international trade publication Screen Digest which he edited from 1971 to 1996. John's association with Focal Pressled to him later to become the founding trustee of the Kraszna-Krausz Foundation.
Joy Chittock died in 2001 and John is survived by his second wife Margaret.
A funeral Service and burial at St Mary’s Church Cavendish, Suffolk, CO10 8BP will take place on Friday 21st October 2011 at 1pm. All welcome afterwards at The George, donations in lieu of flowers gladly received by St Nicholas Hospice, BSE, IP33 2QY.
More biographical information is available: http://homepages.which.net/~john.chittock/biog.htm
Fictionalising the bio of 19th-century photographic innovator Julia Margaret Cameron, David Rocklin creates, in Catherine Colebrook, a woman fascinated by the dawning of scientific photography. The novel opens in 1836 in South Africa, where Catherine is preparing to depart for Ceylon, a British colony off the coast of India (present-day Sri Lanka). Colebrook is fascinated by the process of capturing images on tin or copper; she has heard about the technique from Sir John Holland, a visiting lecturer, and so the story goes ....
Over the course of February and March, Catherine and Sir John experimented with various chemical combinations. They used guncotton to bathe the plates in silver salt. They lacquered skins of collodion onto them and potassium mixed with oil of lavender to lend flexibility. They conversed in drams and durations. Light and shadow became their accomplices. … Sir John taught her and Eligius how to grind and polish glass for lenses. They reconfigured the camera’s plate holder with a spring-loaded trap of imported rosewood. For the collodion and silver salt, Eligius constructed vertical baths so the plates might be coated evenly. On his own he experimented with mirrors and angles. By spring he’d created his own topography of the light’s possibilities in Holland House. (p. 219).
One reviewer went all the way to say "This fascinating story made me want to run to the library and learn everything about the 19th century British photographer, Julia Margaret Cameron".
You can be the judge of this yourself as you can read more reviews of the book here, or get a copy yourself using the Amazon link on the right.
I attended a photo event at the Royal Geographical Society (London) a few weeks ago, and had a sneak glimpse of a new exhibition that the RGS was setting up.
Entitled "Rivers of Ice: Vanishing Glaciers of the Greater Himalaya", it provided a worrying insight into the impact of climate change in the Himalayan mountains. US photographer, filmmaker and mountaineer David Breashears has put together a collection of works to compare his contemporary images with historical photographs taken over the past century, to show changes in the landscape and the dramatic glacial loss that has taken place in this region.
Even if you're not a green or eco-person, the exhibition is still well worth a visit as it shows some stunning mountain images taken by pioneering alpine photographers and explorers from the 1920s such as Major E.O. Wheeler, George Mallory, and Vittorio Sella.
Details of the exhibition can be found here.
Photos: Top: This striking image taken by David Breashears' team of mountaineers shows snow peaks like cake icing leading to the base of the Rongbuk Glacier in the Himalayan mountains. It was inspired by archived photographs taken 80 years ago; Bottom: This photograph shows the main Rongbuk Glacier in the Himalayan mountains, Tibet as it was in 1921, covered in snow and ice and in sharp contrast to the landscape today.
Photos: Top: Snow but mostly rock: The team's image shows the Kyetrak Glacier in the Himalayan mountain range in Tibet and clearly illustrates the different conditions at altitude compared with the area more than 80 years ago. Bottom: A black and white photograph of the same region in Tibet and dated from 1921 reveals just how much the region has changed and what the impact has been of global warming on the area.
I have recently acquired a few photographs from photographers such as Henri Cartier, Capa, Stichen, Avedon, Kertesz etc. They had been acquired from an individual who had himself acquired it over a decade ago from another individual and so it difficult to trace ownership. However, behind most photos is a label which say "Art Collection - Arthur Saltzmann - Great Britain".
Given that the term used is Great Britain versus UK, would suggest this might be a pre-war to post-war collector. Anyone with information about an Arthur Saltzmann would be greatly appreciated.
Thank You
The Latest E-Photo Newsletter is up online. It's nearly complete and will go out to our email readers tomorrow. You can see it here: http://www.iphotocentral.com/news/issue_view.php/194/184 .
Here are some of the articles that you'll find there:
--George Eastman House Charity Auction results
--Daguerreian Society holds 23rd symposium on October 27-30 in St. Petersburg, FL
--Tokyo Photo 2011: a work still in process
--Photo Gallery Shows: Julia M. Cameron at Hans P. Kraus, Jr. and a preview of Paris Photo at Lawrence Miller Gallery, plus two more gallery shows on Madison
--Russell Lord appointed curator at New Orleans Museum of Art
--Photo book review: a Smithsonian survey of portraiture's changing face
--Ruscha archive and photos goes to Getty
--Persian album by Pesce sells for £39,000
--Penelope Dixon & Assoc. moves back to NYC
--Searching for oldest dated wedding photo
--Internet Site Spotlight: British Photography HistoryChina in Revolution assembles a remarkable survey of historical photographs from leading collections around the world. The images stretch from the Second Opium War to the Boxer Rebellion and wars with Russia and Japan, the outbreak of revolution, through the rise and fall of Yuan Shikai and the ensuing warlord era.
The 1911 Revolution ended dynastic rule in China and paved the way for the founding of Asia's first republic. Triggered by an accidental bomb explosion in Wuchang (modern-day Wuhan), the revolution marked the culminating point of decades of internal rebellion, foreign aggression and political decline; its leaders drew on a ferment of reformist and revolutionary ideas produced by some of China's greatest modern thinkers. Although 1911 did not resolve China's problems, it changed the country for ever, clearing a path for modernisation, and making possible the more decisive revolution of 1949.
For this book, Liu Heung Shing set off on a year-long journey searching for original copies of photographs that suited the theme, often travelling to museums, libraries and visiting owners of private collections across many continents.
Using advanced restoration technology, Liu chose 900 plus photos out of 10,000. It include 300 images that have never been published before, such as American Homer Lea training the New Army in 1904 in California.
There are a large number of photos showing ordinary people in their daily lives in scenes from1850 to 1928, mostly taken by foreign priests, businessmen, diplomats and travellers.
The book is available in two English versions, by both the Foreign Language Teaching and Research Press, and Hong Kong University Press in cooperation with Columbia UniversityPress, on this link here. Or try the Amazon link on the right.
A talk on the book given by Liu himself has also been scheduled, details of which can be found here.
Photos: An old woman in Guangzhou, Guangdong province, in 1869; A woman missionary in sedan chair in Quanzhou, Fuijian province, 1894.
