Blogs

Displaced Visions: Émigré Photographers of the 20th Century was a major 2013 Jerusalem exhibition and book that reconsidered the work of nearly 100 key immigrants, focussing in particular on the earliest photographs taken by them as artists in their various new countries, exploring how this work expanded photographic practices of the time and influenced the history of the medium. 

On Sunday 2 August from 1700-1830, Nissan Perez, former Curator of Photography at the Israel Museum, Jerusalem, will give a talk about the topic of his book, as part of the 'Insiders/Outsiders' Festival. Nissan will reconsider the work and influence of key figures in modernist photography from the point of view of their status as refugees or immigrants, considering how this condition affected their vision and creativity and enhanced the development of the photographic language in general.

The session will be chaired by photographic historian and curator Colin Ford CBE and held in association with London’s Four Corners Gallery.

To see the rest of the programme clock here: https://insidersoutsidersfestival.org/free-insiders-outsiders-online-events-programme

or to book directly click here: https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/displaced-visions-emigre-photographers-of-the-20th-century-tickets-112790816368

It's interesting to see that a photograph is celebrated on a new UK coin.

This week marks the centenary of the birth of Rosalind Franklin, whose Photograph 51 could be seen as one of the most significant of the 20th century, as it was key to working out the structure of DNA.

To celebrate Rosalind's centenary, it is her photograph - Photograph 51 - that appears on the new 50 pence piece in the UK.

https://www.royalmint.com/our-coins/events/rosalind-franklin/

Joanna Sassoon, Western Australia

The Norfolk Chronicle of Saturday 14 November 1857 carried the headline:- A New Discovery in Photography . “The world is indebted to Mr. W. Olley, of London, for the greatest discovery which has yet been made in photography. Mr. Olley calls it the “Patent Micro-Photographic Reflecting Process.” It consists in fixing an impression of any object placed under the microscope glass, which is afterwards transferred to paper.” This article draws the attention of its readers to a new monthly publication that was to be illustrated with photographs “exhibited as large as a crown piece”  taken using the patented process. 

Mr Olley was William Henry Olley, a Wine Merchant of 2, Brabant Court, Philpot Lane, London. The London Gazette of 25th January 1860 indicates that Olley had patented his process on 6th November 1856.

According to the Museum of Science website http://www.mhs.ox.ac.uk/collections/imu-search-page/narratives/?irn=29169&index=1 the photographs were printed by two Great Yarmouth photographers (identified by blind stamps on the prints), Henry Harmer, a solicitor who became photographer, and William Thornton Fisher, a master mariner, turned optician who also was a photographer. The subscribers listed in the publication included many citizens of Great Yarmouth including a Mr Olley and Henry R Harmer Esq. 

William Henry Olley was born in Middlesex in 1814 the son of Thomas Olley who was born in Lowestoft, Suffolk (not far from Great Yarmouth) in 1777.  WH Olley died at 138 Mildmay Road, Stoke Newington on the 13th May 1890.

Does any member of the forum have a copy of Olley’s patent that they would be willing to share a scan of? Also it is assumed that Olley had relatives in Great Yarmouth but does anybody know if Olley had any other connections with Great Yarmouth? 

Olley’s publication is available on Google Books. 

https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=pgE7DX_vbJMC&printsec=frontcover&source=gbs_ge_summary_r&cad=0#v=onepage&q&f=false

When you look on the internet at the many hundreds of daguerreotype images taken by W E Kilburn what you see, apart from the famous image of the 1848 Chartist rally, is almost entirely portraits of famous and well to do clients taken at his Regent Street studios. Although the Royal Collection does have images of servants, grooms, gamekeepers. beaters etc taken outside.

So I am puzzled as to why we have three early W E Kilburn cased daguerreotype images at Erddig the National Trust property at Wrexham two of which were taken on site at Erddig and one of which is a studio image taken in London. A fourth image is a copy from an original daguerreotype lost in the copying process so not proven to be by Kilburn.

Two of the daguerreotypes in embossed leather Kilburn cases are of known family members and show them clearly on the parterre and the west front staircase. The image of the young lady on the parterre is of Victoria Yorke (ne Cust) thought to date from the mid 1840’s.

The image of the military man is of John Yorke, who at the time it was taken again in the late 1840’s was an officer in the 1st (Royal) Regiment of Dragoons which is now the Blues and Royals (Royal Horse Guards).

John Yorke would go on to the rank of general and was at the Crimea where he took part in the Charge of the Heavy Brigade that proceeded by a couple of hours the infamous Charge of the Light Brigade.

The third cased image is very faded but is of three people a young man and woman and an elderly woman in a studio setting. This may have been of Simon Yorke III and his wife Victoria ( the young lady on the parterre) and Simons mother Margaret Holland. Margaret Holland died in 1848 so again if the subjects are correct then this would have been taken in the same period as the other images noted above.

The fourth daguerreotype is probably the most interesting but the house only have a copy made in 1912 of the original daguerreotype which was, it is thought, lost at the time of the copying. This image is of the main house servants taken on the west front staircase and is stated in the house records to have been taken in 1852. As the original daguerreotype has been lost there is no provenance linking it to Kilburn.

So three cased daguerreotypes by the studio of W E Kilburn and one other image that was from an original daguerreotype.

So how do two of them come to be taken by the W E Kilburn studio at Erddig and a third possibly so when the large majority if not all of the subjects taken by Kilburn were of notable subjects and subjects with royal connections in the Kilburn studio settings in Regent Street? How could this top London photographer with a double royal warrant be tempted to go up to a remote country house just outside Wrexham?

The answer may lie with the lady on the parterre. Victoria Mary Louisa Yorke moved in royal circles. She was a god daughter of Queen Victoria and was the daughter of Sir Edward Cust the master of the royal household. Just perhaps the sort of clients to tempt the Kilburn studio to come to Erddig.

I have used the term the studio of W E Kilburn. I am not sure if Kilburn had a number of trusted assistants or if he took all of the images himself. It would appear likely give the output that he had that some assistance was needed. The only clue is an entry in Simon Yorke’s personal household accounts book for 5th November 1852 which states:

To Mr Barrett for daguerreotypes £6 - 12 -00

A copy of the invoice to which the entry relates has not been found. But it may be that Mr Barrett was part of W E Kilburn’s studio team. The payment was for more than one daguerreotype. The servants image was from 1852 but the
parterre and military man image appear earlier. So for now the mystery continues.

Read this text here: W%20E%20KILBURN.pdf

Four Corners has announced the launch of a Heritage Lottery funded project. The 3-year project will see it delve deeper into Four Corners Archive, evolving the collection into an active site for public events, study, socially-engaged practice and collaboration. Here's what is planned:

• On the Move: the history of the Half Moon Photography Workshop/Camerawork touring exhibitions, 1976-1984.
  More than 50 of these innovative, laminated touring shows were shown across the UK and beyond, in community halls, factory canteens, launderettes and other unconventional spaces. They provide unique insights into community activism, feminism, political struggle, working lives and disappearing traditions. We will research and document original material, leading to an exhibition in 2021.
   
• Research partnership with the Jo Spence Memorial Library Archive at Birkbeck.
  Jo Spence was one of the founder members of HMPW and Camerawork magazine. The project will support a research archivist to work across the Jo Spence and Four Corners archive collections.
   
• A Bengali Photography Archive of activist, family and community photographs to be developed in partnership with Swadhinata Trust and Tower Hamlets Local History Library & Archives.
   
• Exhibition on housing, squatting and homelessness in East London, to be developed with the Centre for Arts Memory and Communities, Coventry University in 2022.

Funded by the National Lottery Heritage Fund, supported by a curatorial research grant from the Paul Mellon Centre. Project partners are Bishopsgate Insitute, Centre for Arts, Memory & Communities at Coventry University, Feminist Library,  Jo Spence Memorial Library at Birkbeck, Mayday Rooms, Swadhinata Trust, Tower Hamlets Local History Library & Archives.

See: https://www.fourcornersfilm.co.uk/whats-on/hidden-histories

The following links are to 3 lots of photographs which turned up as part of a 'downsizing' by one of my clients. My client is descended from Thomas Carlyle who is supposed to have annotated the Julia Margaret Cameron photograph with reference to Goethe's Mignon. There are also cartes-de-visite relating to Carlyle, by various Scottish photographers and an early photograph of Carlyle, family and Provost Swan, probably by John Patrick.

All the lots below will be offered for sale by OPUS on 23/7/2020. I am the contact for the sale jane@opus-auctions.com and I will be on the rostrum on the day. Viewing by appointment, During the Covid 19 restrictions we have been operating from the grounds of a private house so the appointment rule is firm.

Hope you enjoy the photographs. 

Links to the catalogue: 

Julia Margaret Cameron, with annotation by Thomas Carlyle -- Sale date: 23/7/2020 at OPUS

https://www.the-saleroom.com/en-gb/auction-catalogues/opusauctions/catalogue-id-opus-a10073/lot-f20f1ada-11c5-4fb4-bc77-abf40121c11c

John Patrick - Kircaldy

https://www.the-saleroom.com/en-gb/auction-catalogues/opusauctions/catalogue-id-opus-a10073/lot-55f5c6be-46d4-429a-a821-abf40121c118

Thomas Carlyle - Carte de Visite and other photography

https://www.the-saleroom.com/en-gb/auction-catalogues/opusauctions/catalogue-id-opus-a10073/lot-65ef80c6-b047-44d3-8fdb-abf40121c117

When the National Library of Scotland and National Galleries of Scotland acquired the MacKinnon Collection, it made a joint commitment to preserve it in alignment with its growing world class photographic collections and provide access for ever-changing audiences. This talk describes our current cataloguing, digitisation and engagement activities, and explores ways in which the MacKinnon Collection compliments existing strengths in the NLS and NGS photographic collections. Join curator Blake Milteer to hear more. 

Thursday, 16 July 2020
From 1700-1730
Free
Book: https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/saved-for-the-nation-where-does-the-mackinnon-collection-go-from-here-tickets-110249770030

Back in March BPH published a regularly updated blog of how museums, galleries, research venues and events were approaching lockdown with cancellations, postponements and closures. Finally, after more than twelves weeks, museums, galleries and libraries are allowed to open from 4 July, albeit with constraints because of social distancing, the need to protect staff and visitors, and, of course, financial considerations associated with ticketing, shops and cafes and a reluctance of visitors to use public transport or to visit indoor venues . The fact that some venues are able to open does not mean that they will do so. 

Below is an updated list of events and venues. Please comment with other photography venue openings if they are not listed here. Please check before visiting - many venues are now requiring pre-booking.

Events

• Photo London 2020 will take place at Gray’s Inn Gardens, London, from Wednesday 7 October to Sunday 11 October, with an invitation-only VIP Preview on Tuesday, 6 October. See: https://photolondon.org/visiting/ Will return live, possibly in September or October 2021. 
• Photography Show.  Now a virtual photography and video festival over two days on Sunday, 20 and Monday, 21 September 2020. See: https://www.photographyshow.com/ Will return live in September 2021. 
• FORMAT festival, Derby. Opens on 11 March 2021 as planned.

Most venues are operating pre-booking, reduced opening days and hours and not all parts of their building may be open. Check before making a special visit. 

Venues

• National Portrait Gallery. Closed for refurbishment until Spring 2023. Online exhibitions. https://www.npg.org.uk/
• Martin Parr Foundation, Bristol. Re-opens July 2020. See: https://www.martinparrfoundation.org/visit/  
• V&A Museum, London. Re-opening 6 August 2020. Photography Galleries on 27 August. No news of Print Room or NAL. See: https://www.vam.ac.uk/info/plan-your-visit
• National Science+Media Museum, Bradford Science Museum, London. Both re-open 19 August 2020. See: https://www.scienceandmediamuseum.org.uk/visit
• Barbican Gallery and Centre, London,  Re-opens 13 July. See: https://www.barbican.org.uk/
• Tate Galleries. All four Tate galleries open on 27 July. See: https://www.tate.org.uk/
• Royal Photographic Society. Online only until January 2021. see: https://rps.org/news/bristol/2020/june/rps-to-remain-online-until-2021/
• The Photographers' Gallery, London. Re-opens on 14 July 2020. See: https://thephotographersgallery.org.uk/FAQs
• Autograph, London. Re-opening April 2021, but introducing new outreach programmes. https://autograph.org.uk/
• British Library, London. Gradually from 22 July.
• Gallery of Photography, Ireland. Late July.
• Four Corners, London. 9 July. See: https://www.fourcornersfilm.co.uk/
• Whitechapel Gallery, London, from 14 July. See: https://www.whitechapelgallery.org/
• The National Archives, Kew, from 21 July. See: https://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/about/news/coronavirus-update/
• Site Gallery, Sheffield, from 9 September. See: https://www.sitegallery.org/news/plans-to-re-open-site-gallery/

First published 30 June 2020 and updated regularly.

A look at London stations. During the Victorian era, competing railways built several stations in London. Since then, all stations have undergone a major renovation, but many still retain some of their original architectural features, including impressive roof extensions.

London Bridge - Inaugurated in 1836, London Bridge was the first station to be built. Located on the south bank of the Thames via the London Bridge, it was immediately added and rebuilt. The trains served south London, Kent, and Sussex.

Euston - Opened in 1837 and extended soon after by the London and Birmingham Railway and later by the London and North Western Railway. It served Birmingham, in the northwest of England and beyond. Originally designed in the style of classical architecture, the station has undergone a major renovation and little remains of the original station. The name comes from the landowners of the day, the Fitzroy family and their country house, Euston Hall.

Paddington - A Great Western Railways London service terminal was built in 1838 on Bishop's Bridge Road, Paddington. Later, in 1854, traffic increased, saying that the old terminal was inadequate and that the great Victorian engineer Isambard Kingdom Brunel designed the much larger Paddington station across the road.

Fenchurch Street - The first station to be built in the city in 1841 for the London and Blackwall railways. Built in Minories, it was rebuilt in 1854 at its current location on Fenchurch Street. Served trains to Blackwall, Tilbury and Southend in Essex.

Waterloo - Opened in 1848, with several later additions, creating a jumble of platforms and buildings. Rebuilt later. Named after the nearby Waterloo bridge. Served in southwest London and in the counties.

King's Cross - Opened in 1852 for the Great Northern Railway, which serves the main east coast route to Peterborough, York and beyond. Named after a monument to George IV that was erected nearby.

Victoria - Built in 1860 and named after Queen Victoria, the station was divided into two sections and shared by four train companies serving Kent and Sussex.

Cannon Street - Built in the city in 1866 for the South Eastern Railway, which serves south-east London, Kent and East Sussex. Named after the street where it is located.

Charing Cross - Opened in 1864 at The Strand as a link to extend London Bridge services.

St Pancras (shown above right) - Built in 1866. At the time, it had the largest single span roof in the world. The jewel of Gothic architecture at the Midland Great Hotel was built next door. Named after the area in which it is located. Served trains to Midlands and East Yorkshire.

Liverpool Street - Located east of the city of London and replacing an old station in Shoreditch. Inaugurated in 1875 by the Great Eastern Railway, which served Essex and East Anglia. Named after the street where it is located.

Blackfriars - Originally called St. Paul's, it opened in 1886 to serve passengers from South London to the city. Named after the nearby St. Paul's Cathedral, and the area in which it is located.

Marylebone - Built in 1899 on Marylebone Road. One of the smallest stations in London, served Aylesbury and beyond to Manchester.

A look at London stations.

During the Victorian era, competing railways built several stations in London. Since then, all stations have undergone a major renovation, but many still retain some of their original architectural features, including impressive roof extensions.

London Bridge - Inaugurated in 1836, London Bridge was the first station to be built. Located on the south bank of the Thames via the London Bridge, it was immediately added and rebuilt. The trains served south London, Kent and Sussex.

Euston - Opened in 1837 and extended soon after by the London and Birmingham Railway and later by the London and North Western Railway. It served Birmingham, in the northwest of England and beyond. Originally designed in the style of classical architecture, the station has undergone a major renovation and little remains of the original station. The name comes from the landowners of the day, the Fitzroy family and their country house, Euston Hall.

Paddington (shown left) - A Great Western Railways London service terminal was built in 1838 on Bishop's Bridge Road, Paddington. Later, in 1854, traffic increased, saying that the old terminal was inadequate and that the great Victorian engineer Isambard Kingdom Brunel designed the much larger Paddington station across the road.

Fenchurch Street - The first station to be built in the city in 1841 for the London and Blackwall railways. Built in Minories, it was rebuilt in 1854 at its current location on Fenchurch Street. Served trains to Blackwall, Tilbury and Southend in Essex.

Waterloo - Opened in 1848, with several later additions, creating a jumble of platforms and buildings. Rebuilt later. Named after the nearby Waterloo bridge. Served in southwest London and in the counties.

King's Cross - Opened in 1852 for the Great Northern Railway, which serves the main east coast route to Peterborough, York and beyond. Named after a monument to George IV that was erected nearby.

Victoria - Built in 1860 and named after Queen Victoria, the station was divided into two sections and shared by four train companies serving Kent and Sussex.

Cannon Street - Built in the city in 1866 for the South Eastern Railway, which serves south-east London, Kent and East Sussex. Named after the street where it is located.

Charing Cross - Opened in 1864 at The Strand as a link to extend London Bridge services.

St Pancras - Built in 1866. At the time, it had the largest single span roof in the world. The jewel of Gothic architecture at the Midland Great Hotel was built next door. Named after the area in which it is located. Served trains to Midlands and East Yorkshire.

Liverpool Street - Located east of the city of London and replacing an old station in Shoreditch. Inaugurated in 1875 by the Great Eastern Railway, which served Essex and East Anglia. Named after the street where it is located.

Blackfriars - Originally called St. Paul's, it opened in 1886 to serve passengers from South London to the city (free essay writers online according to this topic). Named after the nearby St. Paul's Cathedral, and the area in which it is located.

Marylebone - Built in 1899 on Marylebone Road. One of the smallest stations in London, served Aylesbury and beyond to Manchester.

Facing Britain brings together for the first time outside of the UK a particular view of British documentary photography. Long forgotten and only recently rediscovered photographers such as John Myers, Tish Murtha or Peter Mitchell who are shown alongside works by internationally photographers such as Martin Parr. The show offers an insight into the development of documentary photography in the UK, which is interwoven with that in continental Europe and North America, but also independent of them.

The documentary aspect is one of the great strengths of British photography, which is capable of depicting a part of geographical Europe in transition in a multifaceted, surprising and artistically original way. Facing Britain focuses on the period of Britain's membership of the European Union and its forerunner between 1963 until 2020. In view of the current Corona pandemic, the exhibition proves to be a break in the artistic development of an entire nation.

The photographers being exhibited include five women photographers, but missing are a number of significant photographers of colour who brought - and bring - a distinctive perspective to British documentary photography and the way in which they approached their subject matter.

Included are: John Bulmer, Rob Bremner, Thom Corbishley, Robert Darch, Anna Fox, Ken Grant, Judy Greenway, Paul Hill, David Hurn, Markéta Luskačová, Kirsty Mackay, Niall McDiarmid, Daniel Meadows, Peter Mitchel, David Moore, Tish Murtha, John Myers, Jon Nicholson, Martin Parr, Paul Reas, Simon Roberts, Dave Sinclair, Homer Sykes, Jon Tonks and others.

The exhibition describes the decline of the coal industry, the Thatcher era with the Falkland conflict, and the Brexit that divided the country. A special focus is on the 1970s and 1980s, which were influenced by David Hurn, Tish Murtha, Daniel Meadows and Martin Parr, when artistic documentary photography gained an importance worldwide. Martin Parr describes these decades as 'a formative period for British photography, in which the strength of the documentary movement really came alive'.

In Great Britain, photography was not considered an autonomous art form until the 1980s. The first major survey exhibition on British documentary photography in Great Britain did not take place until 2007 under the title How We Are: Photographing Britain at the Tate Britain, London. Subsequently, the British Council's exhibition No Such Thing As Society: Photography in Britain 1967-1987 toured the UK, Poland and Sweden from 2008 to 2010.

This late tribute to the pioneers of British documentary photography also demonstrated the difficulties of photography in Britain. British photography, with a few exceptions, had difficulty in asserting itself on the international market, not least because of its socially critical or political content and socially critical approaches, which are unmistakable in the work of Ken Grant, Tish Murtha, Homer Sykes, Paul Reas or Anna Fox.

Facing Britain presents a portrait of  Britain that is divided, unequal and interspersed with classes, but marked by deep affection, humanity and humour. The photographs speak for themselves, bear witness to artistic concepts and attitudes and convey historical contexts. They call for a view of today's United Kingdom beyond the clichés. Inequality and identity are still the key concepts that dominate the nation and define what makes the exhibition more relevant than ever. Previously virulent themes such as youth unemployment, the decline of the mining industry or protest and demonstration against the policies of Margaret Thatcher are historically illuminated in the exhibition and critically questioned by the participating photographers. Recent works by Kirsty Mackay, Paul Reas, Robert Darch or Niall McDiramid also reflect current issues on topics such as gender justice, consumer society, Brexit or migration.

Museum Goch 
Kastellstraße 9
D-47574 Goch
27 September-to 7 November, 2020
https://museum-goch.de/

Catalogue in preparation

The exhibition Facing Britain at Museum Goch is a cooperation with IKS Photo, Düsseldorf.
Curator:  Ralph Goertz

The National Stereoscopic Association's 46th convention 3D-Con is going virtual in 2020. There is a two-part session on the history of stereoscopic photography taking place between 0730-1130 (Pacific Time) which is 1530-1930 (BST) on Friday, 14 August 2020.

The public is welcome to join for a morning of scholarship from an international group of historians and registration is free at the link here: http://www.3d-con.com/registration.php

The announcement in The Chemist (March, 1851) of Frederick Scott Archer’s wet-collodion process transformed how photography was practiced professionally and by amateur photographers for much of the nineteenth century. Photography’s reach broadened socially, grew artistically and extended geographically.

Move forward to the 2000s and the wet-collodion process is, again, impacting photographic practice. It has been embraced by photographers and students who are using it for creative and artistic reasons. This has been supported by a growing number of practical workshops allowing people to experience and learn about the process.

This online symposium Don’t Press Print. De/Re-constructing the collodion process is organised by the Royal Photographic Society and the University of West of England’s Centre for Fine Print Research.  It will consist of one-day of papers, a part second day of poster presentations.

Papers and posters are sought for online symposium taking place over two days on 1 and 2 October 2020, which addresses, but is not limited to:

Reconstructing

• Historical overview of the development of the collodion process
• Its impact on photography from 1851up to the present
• Photographers and individuals associated with the process

Deconstructing

• Wet-collodion and print making today
• Contemporary practitioners: their experiences and work
• Collodion and digital hybrid models of working

Proposals

Proposals of up to 500 words are required by 10 August and should be emailed to: director@rps.org. In addition, the conference will take submissions for online posters until 1 September. Details and key dates are in this PDF download.

See more: https://rps.org/collodion

Lee Miller is increasingly championed for her Surrealism-inspired photographs. Her images of Paris during the late-1920s and early 1930s when she was the muse and lover of Man Ray, her unique portraits of a desert landscape taken in and around Egypt in the 1930s, and her witty yet poignant and often disturbing images taken during the Second World War and its aftermath, are often discussed. Yet, while popularity in Miller’s complex life and photographic work is rapidly growing, her true worth as a Surrealist artist in her own right remains open to further scholarly exploration.

This new collection of essays, therefore, aims to validate Lee Miller’s position, not simply as a muse, friend, and collaborator with the Surrealists, but as one of the Twentieth Century’s most important and influential female Surrealist artists.

Submission

Abstracts of 500 words maximum and a short biography to be submitted by Friday 10 July 2020.

Please submit by email to: Dr Lynn Hilditch (editor) at hilditl@hope.ac.uk

See: https://cfpleemiller.carrd.co/ 

Arts Council England has released funding to support photography organisations. This includes £30,000 for Photo London and £280,00 for The Photographers' Gallery. BPH has identified the following photography organisations in receipt of emergency support, or offers of support:

Arts Council NPOs and Creative People and Places Organisations offered funding

• Midlands: Derby Quad Ltd. £137,167
• London: Photofusion. £35,000
• London: The Photographers' Gallery. £280,000
• London: The Whitechapel Gallery, £150,000

Organisations (non-NPO)

• London: Four Corners. £35,000
• London: Photo London Limited. £30,000
• Midlands: Grain Projects CIC. £26,000
• Midlands: Nottingham Photographers Hub. £16,800
• Midlands: Photographic Archive Miners CIC. £22,927
• North: Lumen Arts. £14,500
• South East. Positive View Foundation. £16,837
• South West. IC Visual Lab CIC. £22,000
• South West. Real Photography Company. £20,000

See: https://www.artscouncil.org.uk/covid19 and https://www.artscouncil.org.uk/covid19/data

Illustrated with many newly discovered photographs, this book which is published in October, tells the story of community photography produced by the radical collectives in the 1970s. It examines their politicised magazines and exhibitions, held anywhere from working men’s clubs to laundrettes.

During the 1970s, London-based photographers joined together to form collectives which engaged with local and international political protest in cities across the UK. This book is a survey of the radical community photography that these collectives produced.

The photographers derived inspiration from counterculture while finding new ways to produce, publish and exhibit their work. They wanted to do things in their own way, to create their own magazines and exhibition networks, and to take their politicised photographic and textual commentary on the re-imagination of British cities in the post-war period into community centres, laundrettes, Working Men’s Clubs, polytechnics, nurseries – anywhere that would have them. The laminated panel exhibitions were sufficiently robust, when packed into a laundry box, to withstand circulation round the country on British Rail’s Red Star parcel network.

Through archival research, interviews and newly discovered photographic and ephemeral material, this tells the story of the Hackney Flashers Collective, Exit Photography Group, Half Moon Photography Workshop, producers of Camerawork magazine, and the community darkrooms, North Paddington Community Darkroom and Blackfriars Photography Project. It reveals how they created a ‘history from below’, positioning themselves outside of established mainstream media, and aiming to make the invisible visible by bringing the disenfranchised and marginalised into the political debate.

Pre-Order 'Photography of Community and Protest' by Noni Stacey
Hardcover • 208 Pages • Size: 250 × 190 mm
20 colour illustrations and 92 B&W illustrations
ISBN: 9781848224094 • Publication: October 12, 2020

‘Larry Herman’s Clydeside: Photography of Protest and Community’, Studies in Photography Journal, Winter 2018, The Scottish Society for the History of Photography, National Galleries of Scotland. View Publication.

‘Women and Work, 1975’, article on the Hackney Flashers in Aperture magazine as part of a series of articles highlighting forgotten exhibitions, ‘Photography as you don’t know it’ (Winter 2013) - View Publication.

Two lots coming up at auction provide a link back to the photography's earliest days in 1839. Sotheby's auction of Fine Books and Manuscripts including Property from the Eric C. Caren Collection being held on 21 July 2020 in New York has two lots connected to Alfred Swaine Taylor, the pioneer of forensic medicine and an early experimenter in photography. 

Lot 89 consists of a group of letters, from c1830-1870 which includes references to his  photography experiments. Estimate: US $10,000-15,000. 

Lot 90 is a photogenic drawing of a fern dated 2 December 1839. Estimate: US $10,000-15,000.

BPH readers may recall several groups of material from Taylor's former house which was offered by Lacy Scott & Knight in Bury St Edmunds, in 2017 and in one larger group on 5 October 2018, which included letters, books and personal effects covering his many professional and scientific interests including photography. 

See: http://britishphotohistory.ning.com/profiles/blogs/auction-alfred-swaine-taylor-follow-up and http://britishphotohistory.ning.com/profiles/blogs/auction-report-alfred-swaine-taylor-archive-5-october-2018 

The UK government has announced a £1.57bn package of support for cultural organisations to be delivered through grants and loans, and funding for capital projects. How much is new money, how much will need to be repaid and how much has come from previously announced commitments to the national infrastructure is unclear.  

The package announced includes funding for national cultural institutions in England and investment in cultural and heritage sites to restart construction work paused as a result of the pandemic. The government claims 'this will be a big step forward to help rebuild our cultural infrastructure'.

The package includes:

• £1.15 billion support pot for cultural organisations in England delivered through a mix of grants and loans. This will be made up of £270 million of repayable finance and £880 million grants.
• £100 million of targeted support for the national cultural institutions in England and the English Heritage Trust.
• £120 million capital investment to restart construction on cultural infrastructure and for heritage construction projects in England which was paused due to the coronavirus pandemic.
• The new funding will also mean an extra £188 million for the devolved administrations in Northern Ireland (£33 million), Scotland (£97 million) and Wales (£59 million).

Decisions on awards will be made working alongside expert independent figures from the sector including the Arts Council England and other specialist bodies such as Historic England, National Lottery Heritage Fund and the British Film Institute.

Repayable finance will be issued on generous terms tailored for cultural institutions to ensure they are affordable. Further details will be set out when the scheme opens for applications in the coming weeks.

Although welcomed across the board by leading arts administrators and bodies such as the Royal Opera House, it is unclear whether the funding will actually support smaller organisations not already in receipt of public funding, those outside of London in the same way that London's national bodies look set to benefit, individual artists and freelancers, and venues that have been impacted by social distancing restrictions that are set to be in place for many months. The funding of capital projects may be premature when it is unclear that audiences will return.  

Read the government announcement here:  https://www.gov.uk/government/news/157-billion-investment-to-protect-britains-world-class-cultural-arts-and-heritage-institutions?utm_source=27015a4b-f940-411c-b482-81dceba88625&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=govuk-notifications&utm_content=immediate

In 1862, Albert Edward, Prince of Wales (who would be crowned Edward VII in 1901 following the death of his mother, Queen Victoria), undertook a tour of the Middle East as part of a structured programme intended to educate the young prince and prepare him for his future role as king. The prince had undertaken previous trips abroad, but on this ambitious itinerary he was accompanied by one of Victorian Britain’s pre-eminent photographers, Francis Bedford (1815 – 1894) and this was the first royal tour to be documented through photography. The exceptionally beautiful images taken by Bedford convey the sense of awe and wonder that these ancient sites still, to this day, possess.

Bedford’s remarkable photographs not only documented the historical landmarks and biblical vistas the prince and his entourage encountered, they also became an important, early record of the Ottoman dominions and the Holy Land. Throughout, Bedford’s task was, as the Photographic News put it, to record scenes that were ‘fraught with historic and sacred associations’.

Each of these carefully framed views was painstakingly composed, and, in our own era of Instagram, online visitors will be able to draw immediate parallels and contrasts. Not least, Bedford’s human subjects were required to remain completely still for several seconds so as not to appear as a blur. And, while Instagrammers require little more than a smartphone, Bedford needed an entire caravan of lenses, tripods, heavy crates of chemicals, glass plates, and a complete portable darkroom to achieve the rich depth and detail of his albumen prints.

Sights of Wonder is the third annual collaboration between the Barber, Royal Collection Trust and the University of Birmingham’s Department of Art History, Curating and Visual Studies, a partnership which aims to train up a talented cohort of early career curators in a professional setting. As with previous years, a small group of University of Birmingham MA Art History and Curating students takes responsibility for all aspects of an exhibition, from selecting the individual objects from the Royal Collection, establishing key themes, researching and writing interpretation to devising and contributing to the public programme. This year, alongside the usual curatorial dilemmas, the students faced the additional considerable hurdle of Covid-19, and very rapidly had to recast plans for a physical exhibition into virtual form. They rose to the challenge with aplomb, and have produced the Barber’s first show specifically designed for a digital platform, exploring the greater flexibility and deeper levels of engagement which this switch allowed them.

The exhibition can be enjoyed online as if we were accompanying the tour, following the trajectory of the journey, starting with Egypt. Here, we first appreciate the remarkable detail that Bedford’s lens captured in the ancient settings, from desert terrain to the finely carved texture of the stone blocks and pillars of the ruined temples of Karnak, in Thebes. Looking at these images, we may wonder, as the Prince of Wales and his photographer surely did, at the inevitability of the rise and fall of empires.

We then join the entourage in the Holy Land, Lebanon and Syria. Bedford and the royal party would have been acutely aware of both the biblical history and contemporary politics of the region, the latter as turbulent in the 1860s as today. Two years before the royal tour reached Damascus, the escalation of the conflict between Maronites – a Christian group – and Druzes – a religious community associated with Shi’a Islam – saw the destruction of the Christian quarter and the slaughtering of thousands of Christians. Bedford took photographs which showed the aftermath, The Street Called Straight and The Ruins of the Greek Church in the Christian Quarter as well as a portrait of Abd al-Qadir (1808 – 1883), the Algerian religious and military leader who played a key role in helping Christians escape the massacre. The tour then eventually travelled to the more peaceful but no less resonant city of Constantinople (modern day Istanbul), the capital of the Ottoman Empire, and then on to Athens, whose illustrious past would have been deeply familiar to educated Victorians through the works of the great classical writers and philosophers.

Stepping aside from the curators’ primary visual narrative, which draws out the complexities of the Victorian response to the Middle-East through Bedford’s images, our virtual visitors can also explore a range of other options online, from an interactive map of the journey, to detailed video demonstrations of the photographic process used by Bedford. Further resources and activities designed for a variety of age groups and interests are available for virtual visitors to use and share in this discovery section. 

Robert Wenley, the Barber’s Deputy Director, said: ‘Bedford’s photographs were taken just a generation after the birth of the medium and yet they have a technical mastery and aesthetic impact that has rarely been matched.  This is compelling in itself and arguably even easier to appreciate on screen than in a dimly-lit physical gallery, but the curators’ interpretation of these images takes us beyond their seductive surfaces, and opens up fascinating issues around the nature of empire and the resonance of biblical landmarks to a deeply Christian Victorian Britain.  We are enormously grateful to both our student curators and Royal Collection Trust for working so fruitfully and energetically in partnership with us, particularly in such unpredicted and challenging circumstances’ 

Alex Sheen, Art History and Curating MA student, University of Birmingham, added: ‘Curating in a crisis is definitely not something we envisaged at the start of this project, but the rapidly unfolding situation opened up a valuable opportunity to learn how curation can adapt to the changing world. Through creating the digital exhibition, we now have the benefit of offering greater accessibility and therefore reaching a wider audience. Working with the staff at the Barber and Royal Collection Trust, we’ve aimed to curate an innovative and immersive experience, which visitors can enjoy from the comfort and safety of their homes, wherever they may be.'

Alessandro Nasini, Curator of Photographs, Royal Collection Trust, said: ‘Working with the students on this project has been an absolute pleasure and an enriching experience for all parties. The young curators had the challenging task of selecting a relatively small number of items from a large pool of material made available to them, analysing it, interpreting it and presenting it to the public. Some of these steps took place during visits to Windsor Castle, where our Photograph Collection is housed. We had the opportunity to look closely at the material, while exchanging ideas and openly discussing the many options offered by the material itself and our interpretation of it. From my perspective, it felt like such a refreshing and stimulating experience, almost as if I were looking at some of Bedford’s photographs for the first time. During one of the visits, the student curators also had the opportunity to learn about various behind-the-scenes processes and procedures every exhibition goes through, including the essential work from our colleagues in Conservation. I’d like to congratulate the students on their hard work on the exhibition and thank staff at the Barber Institute and at the University of Birmingham for supporting and facilitating this initiative and such a rewarding partnership.’

For more information about Sights of Wonder: Photographs of the Royal Tour visit barber.org.uk. Follow @barberinstitute on Twitter, Instagram and Facebook for regular updates, news and opportunities to engage with the Barber.

Images:

Francis Bedford: The Sphinx, the Great Pyramid and two lesser Pyramids, Ghizeh, Egypt;  The Prince of Wales and Group at the Pyramids, Giza, Egypt.  Royal Collection Trust / © Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II 2020