Blogs

Skewed, cynical, and socially ambiguous, the photographs of Garry Winogrand epitomised the experimental style and irreverent attitude of post-war American street photography. This, along with the support of the Museum of Modern Art and its influential director of photography John Szarkowski, granted his work a significant presence in New York’s art world during the late 1960s and ‘70s. However, at the height of his fame, Winogrand turned his camera back on this world, producing a withering depiction of the exclusive art openings, functions, and balls held at institutions such as MoMA and The Metropolitan Museum of Art during the Vietnam war. In a seemingly bizarre development, this body of work would go on to be exhibited at MoMA in 1977 – alongside his shots of protests, sporting events, and press conferences – putting the museum’s institutional framework on display within its walls.

Simon Constantine's paper will consider the extent to which this exhibition and its accompanying photobook, Public Relations, can be understood as evidence of a little-recognised strain of institutional critique within Winogrand’s street photography. In doing so, it will seek to offer a non-formalist understanding of American street photography as a practice forged in dialogue with the wider post-war avant-garde. It will also attempt to explain the presence and status of these apparent critical tendencies within the work of an otherwise establishment photographer.

Simon Constantine is Lecturer in History of Photography at Birkbeck, University of London. His work addresses street photography and recent documentary photography, with a particular focus on large-scale projects and photobooks which seek to map, criticize, or conceptualize the contemporary global economy. He has presented papers at SOAS, the University of Birmingham, Roma Tre University, and the Institute of Historical Research, and worked as an editor for the journal parallax. His writings have been published in the Oxford Art Journal, Arts, and The Burlington Magazine.

Street Photography as institutional critique? Gary Winogrand's photographs of the art world
30 November 2021 at 1800 (GMT)
43 Gordon Square, London, WC1H 0PD
Birkbeck History and Theory of Photography Research Centre

Image: Garry Winogrand, Opening, Frank Stella Exhibition, The Museum of Modern Art, New York, 1970

Belfast based photographer Donovan Wylie will deliver an artist talk at the Martin Parr Foundation in Bristol on his creative practice, followed by a book signing. This talk will also be streamed live via Zoom. Donovan will address questions around process, touching on how conversations begin and evolve within the medium of photography, both conceptually and through methodology.

Talking through many of his projects – such as The Maze and Outposts – he will also discuss how processes develop (or do not develop!) and how one project leads into another.

Donovan Wylie talk and book signing
23 November 2021 at 1900 (GMT) 
Gallery Ticket - £6 - Zoom Ticket - £3 / £5 / £10 (pay what you can)
See: https://www.martinparrfoundation.org/events/donovan-wylie-2/

Image: G40. S Armagh. From Project British Watchtowers 2005 © Donovan Wylie

Youth of Yesterday is an exhibition featuring photographs taken of young people in Bethnal Green from the 1970s by photographer Philip Cunningham. In the mid-1970s Philip was a youth worker at Oxford House while studying art at Ravensbourne College of Art. While a student, Philip became interested in photography and Oxford House had a fully equipped dark room and was home to Tower Hamlets Arts Group. Philip took hundreds of photographs of local people at a time when Bethnal Green was seeing great change. These photographs capture daily life, friendship, streets, and youth culture in the late 1970s.

In this talk Philip will be showcasing and discussing more of his images about the East End and the stories behind them.  This talk accompanies the exhibition... YOUTH OF YESTERDAY, 22 September - 17 December at Oxford House

Photographing the East End: Philip Cunningham In Conversation
25 November 2021
1830-1930 (GMT), live event, free
Oxford House in Bethnal Green
Derbyshire Street
London, E2 6HG
See more and book here

MACK, the book publisher, has announced its new annual research fellowship, in which it invites proposals for books that investigate an area of cultural history which is deserving of and lacking in critical attention. 

It is especially interested in projects that include, but are not limited to, untold historic lineages, overlooked collectives and communities, specific movements of activism and collaboration, and artists who work in the intersection of art, photography and literature in new ways. The successful candidate will research, edit, write the primary text for, and manage the production of a book on the subject to be published by MACK.

The role can be adapted to the work and life commitments of the successful candidate, but we anticipate that it will either involve an estimated 2 days a week commitment over a 6-month period, or a block of approximately 40 - 50 days within an agreed time frame. The successful applicant will receive a fee of £8,000 plus funding for agreed costs. 

Applicants should send a covering letter with their CV and the names of two referees to fellowship@mackbooks.co.uk by no later than 20 January 2022, outlining their proposed research project (including key thesis, figures, events, movements and so on), together with relevant past research and proven track record in no more than two A4 pages maximum. Successful candidates will be invited for an interview.

See: https://mackbooks.co.uk/pages/job-vacancies

An open-access archive of more than 100,000 digitised photographs of British art and architecture is now available to search and download. Between 1964 and 1969 the Paul Mellon Foundation began to collate an internationally important collection of reference photographs of British paintings, sculpture, architecture, and the decorative arts, as well as images of sketchbooks and exhibitions.

The photographic archive provided access to art that was often locked behind the closed doors of Britain’s private country houses and collections. This activity was continued when the Foundation was re-established as the Paul Mellon Centre (PMC) in 1970, and maintained until 2013, at which point the collection contained more than 100,000 reference images.

This historically important and visually rich collection has now been digitised, with typed and handwritten descriptive notations transcribed for searchability, and is available, free, online.

Visitors to the online resource, can learn about the nation’s heritage through images collated from the exhibition, publication and sale of British works of art.

Users are able to download, compare, and contrast the works using digital tools. More than 44,000 images are available for reuse, offered with a Creative Commons licence for non-commercial purposes. In doing so the PMC joins major international institutions like the Rijksmuseum, whose open access image collections have become significant resources for new artistic and research projects.

A series of short essays (https://photoarchive.paul-mellon-centre.ac.uk/groups) on the archive platform outline the continued relevance of this historical resource. Bendor Grosvenor writes on the uses of the collection in the identification and reattribution of works of art; Paris Spies-Gans (Harvard University) discusses the historical gender biases and omissions intrinsic in the collection; Martin Postle (PMC) outlines how images can be helpful in the preservation and restoration of damaged works; and Anjalie Dalal-Clayton (UAL) and Ananda Rutherford (Tate/UCL) consider the historical implications of Eurocentric, racist, outmoded, and other problematic terminology used in cataloguing historic collections.

There is also a series of short films (https://photoarchive.paul-mellon-centre.ac.uk/groups/archive-journeys) which demonstrate the archive in use from the point of view of an artist, an archivist, a curator, a dealer, a photographer, and a conservator.

Visit the Photographic Archive online catalogue : https://photoarchive.paul-mellon-centre.ac.uk/collections

Thanks to a transformational gift of £2 million from The Bern Schwartz Family Foundation, the Bodleian Libraries are recruiting a Curator of Photography for the first time. Your will increase the impact of our photographic holdings by carrying out a full range of curatorial work including: answering enquiries; teaching and public engagement activities with the collections; cataloguing; and collection development.

You can expect to work with incredible collections, documenting photography from its earliest days through to contemporary photography. You will be passionate and knowledgeable about photography, possess the strong communication skills needed to share these collections with the Libraries’ many audiences, and the know-how to ensure the collections are managed in-line with the Libraries’ curatorial standards.

The candidate we are looking for could be an experienced curatorial professional with an extensive professional network in the world of photography and photographic collections, or a talented individual with less experience in either curation or photography, but the clear potential and desire to address any gaps in your current skillset.

Benefits include 38 days’ leave (including bank holidays and fixed closures), a generous pension scheme, extensive training and development opportunities, access to travel and childcare schemes, and much more. See  https://www.jobs.ox.ac.uk/benefits#/ for further details.

You will be required to upload a supporting statement as part of your online application. Your supporting statement should list each of the essential and desirable selection criteria, as listed in the further particulars, and explain how you meet each one. Please do not include CVs in your application.

Only applications received online before 12.00 midday (GMT) on Friday 19 November 2021 can be considered. Interviews are expected to take place on Thursday 9 December 2021.

For further particulars, and details of how to apply, please click here.

It is 60 years ago this month since the first ever exhibition in the UK of Photography as a Fine Art was held in the Concert Suite at the Royal Festival Hall in London. Whilst photography had been recognized as a Fine Art by many galleries in USA, including The Eastman House and the Museum of Chicago, the “establishment” at the Royal Photographic Society in London were less progressive with their views at that time.

It was with this background that S.D.Jouhar (who had argued for many years that photography was, indeed, a Fine Art) formed The Photographic Fine Art Association in August 1961, and he was it’s Chairman. Others on the committee included Louis Demolin, Hubert Davey, Dennis Gasser and Bertram Sinkinson.

The Association had, as it’s definition of Fine Art:

"Creating images that evoke emotion by a photographic process in which one's mind and imagination are freely but competently exercised. From a technical point of view, therefore, personally controlled, disciplined interpretation and technical execution, showing fine perception and skill in the making shall be necessary requirements of such work in colour or monochrome.”

Works of art were provided for the Exhibition by Geoffrey Ashbourne FRPS, J Bell FRPS (Trichrome-Gum Process), H Cartwright, R H Cherry (Trichrome-Gum Process), Louis Demolin, Eric Freeborn FIBP FRPS, Miss Jeanette Klute, the late George Halford and S.D. Jouhar, (all of whose works for this Exhibition were Ektacolor Prints).

A second exhibition based entirely on S.D.Jouhar’s works was mounted and held at Ealing Technical College later in 1961. No less than 12,000 people visited it during a two-week period. Examples of S.D.Jouhar’s photographs can be seen at http://www.sdjouhar.com

The V&A Photography Centre has been entirely rehung with two new photography displays. Maurice Broomfield: Industrial Sublime presents the late photographer’s dramatic photographs of mid-century British and foreign industry, and Known and Strange: Photographs from the Collection highlight photography’s power to transform the familiar into the unfamiliar, and the ordinary into the extraordinary. 

Maurice Broomfield: Industrial Sublime showcases the late photographer’s dramatic photographs of mid-century British and foreign industry, capturing factories and their workers in an era of rapid transition. Born to a working-class family near Derby, Maurice Broomfield (1916-2010) worked at the city’s Rolls Royce factory after leaving school at the age of fifteen. He attended Derby Art College in the evenings, then worked in advertising before earning a position as Britain’s premier industrial photographer throughout the 1950s and 60s.

The display features over 40 original exhibition prints, drawn from Broomfield’s extensive archive housed at the V&A. These are shown alongside a selection of Broomfield’s cameras – lent from the private collection of his son, the renowned documentary film maker Nick Broomfield – as well as other contextual items which have never been exhibited before, including historic film footage, audio recordings, press cuttings, contact prints, negatives, trade publications and pages from works order books, shining a light onto the photographer’s working processes.

Most of Broomfield’s photographs were originally commissioned for publication in company reports, but he also selected and printed some of them at large scale for inclusion in photography exhibitions. From shipyards to papermills, textiles to food production, and atomic power stations to car manufacture, Broomfield emphasised the dramatic, romantic, sublime and sometimes surreal qualities of industry. Today, many of the factories he photographed – and the communities of workers and skills that supported them – have either vanished or been subsumed into global corporations.

His archive, containing over 30,000 images, comprising negatives, contact prints, exhibition prints, press cuttings, business records, and promotional materials, survives as a valuable record of this history, while his images can be appreciated for their artistry. Highlights include his spectacular image of a half million-volt charge on ceramic insulators for Royal Doulton potteries; a surreal scene of a woman inspecting the assembly of a generator for the English Electric Company; blast furnaces and fettlers at the Ford car factory at Dagenham; and the high-tech lighting laboratory at Phillips in the Netherlands. Broomfield’s photographs remain relevant today, prompting questions about digital technologies replacing manual labour, the UK entering an uncertain economic future in relation to the rest of the world, and the toxic social and environmental legacy of industry.

To accompany the display, the V&A has published a new book on Maurice Broomfield, written by V&A Senior Curator Martin Barnes and with a foreword by Nick Broomfield. Barnes discusses the life and work of Maurice, whom he came to know well as he worked to transfer his archive from his Hampshire home to the museum.

Images:
Top right: Maurice Broomfield, Woman Examining a Sample, Shell International, Holland Laboratories, 1968. © Estate of Maurice Broomfield.
Centre and lower: Installation shots of the Broomfield display. Courtesy: V&A Museum, London. 

Leicester's De Montfort University has re-launched its MA in photographic history with an innovative new distance learning approach to teaching that allows students to take the course at their own pace. The new course starts from January 2022 and then runs on a termly rolling basis meaning students can join at three points during the year, building up credits to a full MA.

The postgraduate course builds on remote teaching expertise developed over the past two years and will particularly suit students and those simply wishing to learn, especially from outside of the UK and unable to commit to full-time, or even traditional part-time, study. Teaching is asynchronous except for tutorials which are by appointment. All students will have anytime access to audio and/or visual material of lectures. 

Units of 15 learning credits can be completed on a standalone basis offering those simply wishing to develop knowledge in particular areas a rigorous and assessed pathway to do so. Any credits can be used to extend this in to a full MA. Those looking to study full-time can complete a MA in one year, or part-time in two years. 

The standard modules are: 

• Learning Photographic History Online (compulsory for all students)
• Photographic Historiography I (15 credits)
• Photographic Historiography II (15 credits)
• Photography and the Arts (15 credits)
• Photography, Science and Technology (15 credits)
• Photography, Ethics and Emotions (15 credits)
• Material Histories 1830s to 1930s (15 credits)
• Material Histories 1930s to Now (15 credits)
• Photography and Politics (15 credits)
• Photography and Digital Politics (15 credits)
• Fieldwork (30 credits)
• Dissertation or Heritage Project (60 credits)

Each 15 credit module encompasses 150 hours of learning, researching and assessment. The 30 credit module and 60 credit module are 300 and 600 hours respectively.

Full details can be found here: https://www.dmu.ac.uk/study/courses/postgraduate-courses/photographic-history-ma-degree/photographic-history-ma-degree.aspx

Do you have experience in developing and telling engaging stories to non-specialist audiences? Do you want to play a key role in an exciting project for the National Science and Media Museum?

The Sound and Vision galleries will bring our world-class collections of photography, film, television and sound technologies to the forefront of the National Science and Media Museum. New galleries will highlight the significant contribution sound and visual technologies have had on the world, and a programme of activities developed alongside the galleries will raise aspirations, develop skills and increase digital confidence in young people. Sound & Vision’s galleries and activities will be a driving force in the regeneration of Bradford.

We are now recruiting for a story weaver who can lead the creative content for the National Science and Media Museum’s transformation of its public offer through the Sound and Vision Masterplan Project. As Interpretation Manager you will develop and implement the gallery interpretation strategy for the project. Through your work with the project team, architects, designers and other contractors you will ensure that the interpretation elements are creative, engaging and connect with our audiences.

You will understand the importance of design, AV, interactives and text in the exhibitions, bringing skills for writing briefs, directing contractors and designers to achieve excellence in our interpretive approach. You will also work on our collaborative community projects to develop content that will be shown on gallery.

The role will sit in the exhibitions team, but will be operate across departments, particularly the curatorial, masterplan and learning teams to help deliver new and innovative ways to tell stories about our collections to a broad range of audiences.

For further information and to apply please visit: https://bit.ly/3BAQfhG

The V&A’s Collections Division comprises six curatorial, research, and conservation and collections care and access teams. The curatorial departments are arranged as Decorative Art and Sculpture; Performance, Furniture, Textiles and Fashion; Art, Architecture, Photography and Design; and Asia. The staff in these teams are at the heart of the founding purpose of the museum: to care for, research and develop the collections, to exhibit them to the public, to make them available for study and research, and to broaden access to the collections.

This is an exciting new role and the postholder will take responsibility for the development, care of, documentation and research, presentation, and interpretation of a part of V&A’s Collection, in this case, the Photography Collection. The role is especially focused on curating contemporary photography. The postholder will be expected to represent the Museum at the highest level and play an active role in the field of contemporary photography collecting, nationally and internationally.

As a member of the Art Architecture, Photography and Design, the postholder will also play a role in the wider work of the V&A, contributing to policy, projects and public programmes, supporting fundraising and income generation, and supporting senior colleagues in the running of the Department, including by creating a positive environment, encouraging collaboration across the museum, supporting change, leading and managing Assistant Curators and sharing knowledge, expertise and best practice to help them develop and perform.

Closing date for receipt of applications is 8 November 2021 at 23.59

Article on the female figure photographer, Eva Grant. She was born in Istanbul, grew up in Greece, and became a student nurse in London. To supplement her meagre income, she did a bit of swimwear modelling, only to find out she had a real passion for being on the other side of the camera. She was active during the 1950s and early sixties. She published her own magazine called Line and Form that ran for around 40 issues.  https://pamela-green.com/all-about-eva-grant/

Image © Eva Grant

Recently found this Tin Type on a notable online auction site and thought what lovely bonnets the couple are wearing. On that and nothing else I decided to buy the picture. When it arrived I removed the frame and glass protection and scanned the image at 1200dpi to see what I had bought.

A superb backdrop of three of the arches on Brighton Beach is what I suspect I might see and then there were the hats.



Next the precise location was to be found and this was established as on the beach outside an arch directly what is today 'The Brighton Fishing Museum'. It apppears the lady sitter is sitting on one of the still extant pieces of antique fishing boat winding gear.



Below is the view looking north from the sea and back to the arches - very similar to the original camera position.



If the original picture is combined with the Google view of the location it is most apparent the images are identical in location and perspective.

A number of recent interviews for the Pittsburgh Photo Fair may be of interest to BPH readers. They cover a range of topics including conservation, collecting, contemporary publishing, and historical photobooks by women. Details are below:

Challenging the Canon: Olga Yatskevich on Photobook History

What They Saw: Historical Photobooks by Women 1843–1999, focuses on historically significant photobooks produced by women. Officially released on 1 November 2021, the book was recently shortlisted for the Paris Photo - Aperture Foundation Catalogue of the Year Award 2021. I spoke with Olga Yatskevich about 10x10’s ongoing exploration of photobook history and the underrepresentation of women in this field. 

Reimagining Aperture: In conversation with Sarah Meister

Following an exceptional curatorial career at the Museum of Modern Art, New York, Sarah Meister joined Aperture as Executive Director in May 2021. I spoke with Sarah about Aperture’s history, her vision for its future, and the central role of photography in our contemporary experience.

Sotheby’s Photographs at 50: Brandei Estes on Collecting

This year Sotheby’s celebrated the 50th anniversary of its first photographs auction, which took place at Sotheby’s London in 1971. Coinciding with this occasion, I spoke with Brandei about the evolution of the art photography market. We discussed what drives her passion for photography and her advice for new collectors.

Photography in Four Dimensions: Paul Messier on Conservation

An interview with Paul Messier about the extensive collection of historic photographic papers he assembled, now held at Yale. We discussed recent projects from his expansive career in conservation and current challenges in the field.

Sotheby's latest sale of Travel, Photographs, Maps and Natural History is now available online and the auction runs 9-17 November. Notable 19th century photographs and photobooks include:

Lot 8. A newly discovered 1860s album of photographs of China and Japan by John Thomson, Milton Miller, John Dudgeon, J.C. Watson, and Charles Frederick Moore. 

Lot 9. Collection of thirty-six photographs of China by Thomas Child and others.

Lot 10. A rare 1872 Foochow printed vocabulary and handbook of the Chinese language with contributions by John Thomson and Dr John Dudgeon on photographic terms and apparatus in English and Chinese.

Lot 21. An early album of photographs of Japan by Felice Beato, circa 1868.

Lot 50. A first edition of Maxime du Camp's photobook Egypte, Nubie, Palestine et Syrie (1852) with 125 salted paper prints.

Lot 146. A rare example of the Photographic Club's Album for the year 1857, one of circa 50 copies published, containing salted paper and albumen prints by members including Roger Fenton, Oscar Rejlander, Hugh Welch Diamond, John Dillwyn Llewelyn, Benjamin Brecknell Turner and Francis Bedford.

Lot 148. A carbon print by Benjamin Brecknell Turner of The Mill Stream, Boulter's lock.

Lot 176. A signed photograph portrait of Robert Falcon Scott by John Thomson.

View the sale here: www.sothebys.com/travel

This new publication has been published by Bristol Ideas as part of Bristol Film 2021. It consists of specially commissioned essays written by people from across the city or with specialist knowledge of cinema, including William Friese-Greene. It is available to collect from venues across the city including the Royal Photographic Society, Watershed and Arnolfini. 

Opening up the Magic Box. Friese-Greene and Reflections on Film
Melanie Kelly (editor)
Bristol Ideas, 2021, 196 pages
Available free

The V&A London is seeking a Curator, Digital Art. This is one of nine Curator posts that sit in the Art, Architecture, Photography and Design Department. The post holder will take responsibility for the development, care of, documentation and research, presentation, and interpretation of a part of V&A’s Collection, in this case, digital art. The Museum holds one of the world’s largest and most important collections of computer-generated art, created from the 1950s onwards. As such, the postholder will be expected to represent the Museum at the highest level and play an active role in the field of computer and digital art collecting, nationally and internationally.

As a member of the Art, Architecture, Photography and Design Department, the postholder will also play a role in the wider work of the V&A, contributing to policy, projects and public programmes, supporting fundraising and income generation, and supporting senior colleagues in the running of the Department, including by creating a positive environment, encouraging collaboration across the museum, supporting change, leading and managing Assistant Curators and sharing knowledge, expertise and best practice to help them develop and perform. The postholder will also play a role in the community of practice digital art, design and photography Senior Curators, Curators and Assistant Curators that will span the four curatorial teams.

Details here: https://app.vacancy-filler.co.uk/salescrm/Careers/CareersPage.aspx?e=LMo8nnTwYNZ-kppOIIdifD8XhL7Lz3TggHk9gf4pbl76oGRijDFpkXVgxlUqvquuVwLKrZE9RVo~&iframe=true

Impressions Gallery are seeking to appoint a Curatorial Programme Manager to work as part of our small and dedicated team. The person will manage our programme of innovative, thought-provoking photographic exhibitions, commissions, touring and other projects that realise the gallery’s artistic vision, and its commitment to diverse, and often marginalised, audiences. Other key responsibilities include overseeing and implementing our press and marketing strategy, supporting our learning, engagement and event programmes, and championing Impressions Gallery nationally and internationally.

We are looking for a dynamic, creative and ambitious individual, who is highly organised and able to balance multiple projects and priorities. Applicants must have relevant photographic knowledge and experience of working within a professional contemporary visual arts environment.

See:https://www.impressions-gallery.com/opportunity/curatorial-programme-manager/

The Classic magazine has recently published two features of interest to British photography. The London Photograph Fair - 40 Years On looks at this pioneering fair which will mark its fortieth anniversary in 2022. Its first outing was on Sunday 12 September 1982, and it was held at The Photographers’ Gallery in Newport Street, just off Charing Cross Road. It was the brainchild of Peter Agius LRPS, Fenton Medallist, and former Chairman of the Historical Group of the Royal Photographic Society. His italic scripted posters will be familiar to those of us who were interested in collection in the 1980s and 1990s. 

"Talking French" is a conversation between Philippe Garner about the British fashion photographer John French who trained many photographers, not least David Bailey and Terence Donovan. 

See: https://theclassicphotomag.com/the-london-photograph-fair-40-years-on/ and 

https://theclassicphotomag.com/talking-french-conversation-with-philippe-garner-about-the-british-fashion-photographer-john-french/

Details of The Classic which is distributed free and available online are here: https://theclassicphotomag.com/

Image: Unknown photographer. Tea time in the studio, 1951. Left to right, Pat Goddard, John French, and assistant and Michael Toll.

Peering into a small, magical box an eager new audience in the 1850s was transported into another dimension. Stereoscopic 3D images allowed them to experience the wonders of the world without ever leaving their fireside, see the heroes of the day in realistic detail, enjoy sentimental scenes or watch the construction of Brunel’s Great Eastern ship on the banks of the Thames. Millions of images were published and voraciously consumed by the public in just a few glorious years.

Dr Brian May and Denis Pellerin reveal some of the highlights of this extraordinary scientific, artistic and social revolution in this special event, transmitted live from the beautiful chapel at King’s College London. The stereoscope was first demonstrated in 1838 by Charles Wheatstone, inventor and Professor of Experimental Philosophy at King's College, which is now the home of his remarkable archive.

Join two of the world’s leading authorities on this early form of virtual reality, Brian May and Denis Pellerin, on the publication of their major new book, Stereoscopy: the Dawn of 3-D.

Stereoscopy: The Dawn of 3-D. Brian May and Denis Pellerin
Wednesday, 10 November 2021, 19:30 - 20:45
British Library, online, book here.