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The Singapore Philatelic Museum will be exhibiting some 100 rare picture postcards capturing the history and heritageof Singapore from early next month. They were taken by G.R. Lambert, a famous German photographer who arrived in Singapore in 1867.
He produced the first picture postcard of Singapore, in addition to taking 3,000 photographs of landscapes and people of Singapore in the 19th century. He was extensively patronised by the British colonial authorities to record political occasions and official visits.
He was not only renowned in Singapore, but also in the region. He was appointed as the official photographer to the King of Siam, and also the Sultan of Johore in British Malaya. And by the end of the 19th century, his photographic company, G.R. Lambert and Co, was the largest and most successful photographic studio in Asia.
During the "Golden Age of Picture Postcards" from 1906 to 1913, there was a postcard craze which saw the company having a turnover of about quarter of a million postcards a year. The exhibition was made possible through the donation of the picture postcards by avid philatelist Koh Seow Chuan.
So, if you are heading to the Far East for a holiday and/or to sample some culinary delights, details of the exhibition can be found here.
Photo: A photograph of Cavanagh Bridge in 19th centurySingapore.
The National Media Museum has a diverse and engaging programme of displays and temporary exhibitions, which are seen by thousands of visitors every year. You’ll help make sure they’re delivered on time, budget and to the highest standards by successfully co-ordinating project teams and other stakeholders.
Required Skills:
If you’ve worked before in a similar role at a gallery or museum, this is a great opportunity to develop your skills further. It calls for experience of managing projects and developing interpretation, supported by a good understanding of delivery procedures and various display techniques. Of course, you’ll also need to be a great team player, with sound IT skills, excellent attention to detail and the ability to communicate well at all levels.
Award winning, visionary and truly unique, the National Media Museum embraces photography, film, television, radio and the web. Part of the NMSI family of museums, we aim to engage, inspire and educate through comprehensive collections, innovative education programmes and a powerful yet sensitive approach to contemporary issues.
The post is fixed term until 12th July 2011
Application Instructions:
Interested? Please send your CV and covering letter to recruitment@nationalmediamuseum.org.uk
For a full job description please email: recruitment@nationalmediamuseum.org.uk
Closing date: 10th June 2010
Interviews: 16th June 2010
We regret that we can only respond to successful applicants.
No agencies please
Brian May & Elena Vidal are just two of a range of artists who have been delighted to create works especially to fit within the limited confines of the gallery. The gallery’s many exhibitions cover a variety of themes, ranging from children’s art, to interior
studies of writer’s rooms, winter landscapes by textile artists, poetry by Word Birds, and magical images of moths from Ottawa. Currently on show are a series of photographs taken of village crafts in Vietnam by local photographer Tessa Bunney, who joins Eamonn McCabe, and Jim des Rivieres to give the programme a truly international flavour.
The Gallery on the Green is especially delighted to host “A Village Lost and Found” as their
first 3D exhibition. It is an exhibition that will allow visitors to travel back in time to the 1850s through the optical magic of the specially-designed stereoscopic viewer that will be the main feature of the display.
On time and in budget, it is expected to reopen in November 2011 with a newgallery that will house 50% more exhibition space. It hopes to boost visitor numbers by 50% to 300,000 a year or more.
The opening shows will include Romantic Camera, a survey of Scotland through the lens, from pioneering images by David Octavius Hill and Robert Adamson to giant Scottish landscapes commissioned by German photographer Michael Reisch. Three photography exhibitions a year will draw on the national collection of 40,000 photographs.
Photo: National Galleries of Scotland director general John Leighton and gallery director James Holloway.
Copyright: Jane Barlow, Scotsman.
The wooden sliding box camera was privately owned by a family of opticians from Braunschweig in northern Germany for generations who had kept the camera in their living room as a decorative object. The 170-year-old apparatus was built in Paris in limited numbers from Jacques Daguerre's original plans by his brother-in-law, Alphonse Giroux.
The daguerreotype, one of only a dozen in the world, all in museums, was put up for sale by the WestLicht auction house in Vienna today (29/5/10), and said that was the highest bid ever for a camera. The winning bid for the historic camera was 610,000 euros, to which was added a 20-percent tax levy, bringing the total price to 732,000 euros. The starting price for the apparatus was 200,000 euros.
The new owner, who requested anonymity, is a collector from the Asian mainland who bid by telephone, said Ema Kaiser, a spokeswoman for the auction house that specializes in vintage photographic equipment.
'Wow, that was cheap,' she quoted him as saying after he had trumped another collector and a museum that were also trying to obtain the Paris-made wooden box camera.
"It is the first time in the world that a daguerreotype bearing Daguerre's signature and made in the Giroux workshop has been offered for sale," WestLicht gallery director Peter Coeln told AFP. The owner who gave the daguerreotype up for auction "had received it as a gift in the 1970s
from his father after receiving his diploma as an optician," Coeln said. Every detail of the daguerreotype including the lens, the plaque signed by Daguerre himself, the black velvet interior and the ground-glass screen are in their original state, WestLicht said.
The Giroux-made daguerreotype is known for having a golden plaque on it
stating that "no apparatus is guaranteed unless it has the signature of
M. Daguerre and the stamp of M. Giroux." The pioneering camera also came
with a user's manual, written in German and edited in 1839 by the
publishing house Georg Gropius in Berlin.
Daguerre never had exclusive rights to the process he invented, instead receiving a pension for himself and the heir of his former partner Nicephore Niepce from the French state, which declared
photography a gift to the world. But businessman Daguerre figured out a way to make money from his fame by signing contracts with the two French workshops giving them exclusive rights to make and sell the equipment.
Funded by the Economic and Social Research Council, and produced by theuniversities of Sheffield and Hertfordshire, London Lives, a five-year project, involved digitising eight London archives or up to 240,000 manuscripts and printed pages. It features a rich variety of documents previously all but inaccessible to the public.
The site allows both amateur and professional historians to searchthe archives for individuals recorded in workhouses, criminal registers, coroners' reports, court orders and papers governing the dispensation of poor relief.
Users of the free site will be able to read scans of the original documents and typed text versions. The idea to map the lives of ordinary Londoners was conceived following the success of a project that digitised the Old Bailey's records. There was a proliferation of documents in urban Britain in the 18th century as civil society flourished and the relationship between the individual and the state was transformed. It is this paper trail that historians will be able to trace in pursuit of an individual's life story.
Writing elsewhere Marcel Safier describes a project which he and Stefan Hughes have joined forces on. The intention is to produce a biography of the neglected but important figure in photograpic history, inventor of the successful collodion photographic process Frederick Scott Archer.
Marcel states: "We became acquainted through our mutual friend, Archer enthusiast and contemporary wet plate practitioner Sean McKenna. Already fresh and interesting material has come to light and it is our intention to chronicle as much of Archer's life as possible and to examine his significance to photography and look in detail at his family and circle of friends."
Stefan has created a website to support the project: http://www.frederickscottarcher.com/
Marcel also appeals for more information: "Some of you may have valuable information you wish to share such as an image, correspondence, a newspaper or journal article or details on one of his friends and collaborators(such as Peter Wickens Fry, Warren De La Rue etc.) I know speaking to one friend on this list that he had actually contemplated writing a book himself on Archer. We certainly want to know if someone else is contemplating that task. There is a forum on our site but we welcome direct email contact. I shall be in touch directly over coming months with those people I know personally on the list that might be able to assist is. Anyone who has suggestions for grant funding or publication of our book is also welcome to make contact."
Running until November 28th 2010, this stunning exhibition offers examples of how photographers between 1840 and 1870 began to explore the possibilities of the art form as a way of remembering moments. The technology being used at the time made recording the "changing aspects of nature" quite difficult, according to the venue, but photographers such as Roger Fenton and George Barnard found they could capture images of important landscapes.
Details of the exhibition can be found here.
Photo: Roger Fenton (1819-1869) The Valley of the Shadow of Death 1856, taken in 1855
Salted paper print from a wet collodion glass negative
H. 28,4 ; W. 35,7 cm; Paris, Musée d'Orsay
© RMN (Musée d'Orsay) / Hervé Lewandowski
Salted paper print from a wet collodion glass negative
H. 28,4 ; W. 35,7 cm; Paris, Musée d'Orsay
© RMN (Musée d'Orsay) / Hervé Lewandowski
For decades, the name of Girault de Prangey had been a source of intrigue to scholars and collectors of early photography. A naturally gifted artist, he soon became one of the earliest masters of the medium. He also took part in the Grand Tour throughout Greece and Italy along with other 18th and 19th century artists and intellectuals.
The full sale catalogue can be found here.
Photo: Joseph-Philibert Girault de Prangey, Rome. T. de la concorde. Ent. Inter., 1842. Daguerreotype. Estimate: $45,000-65,000. Photo: Christie's Images Ltd 2010.
"Photography Not Art" - these three words written by Peter Henry Emerson (1856-1936), one of the principle exponents of photography as an art form in its own right, say a lot about the complexity of a debate which started with the birth of photography and went on for several years. The phrase, replaced in 1899 the expression "Photography, a Pictorial Art" to close his treatise on naturalist photography, proved above all that the absolute diktat of painting had not spared even the most innovative minds.
Published in 1889 byan Anglo-American doctor who had changed career, Naturalistic Photography for Students of the Art was, however, very quickly compared to "dropping a bombshell at a tea party". This was the start of a crusade against the academism of artistic photography. The manifesto was in fact offering an antidote to the artificiality of the composite prints of Henry Peach Robinson (1830-1901), the master of clever manipulation of negatives. Emerson also intended it as a response to the criticisms he had endured since his conspicuous entrance into photography.
Twenty-three yearsafter the only monographic exhibition in France devoted to this polemist photographer, the Musée d'Orsay invites you to (re) discover his first and last collections, two key moments in a career that lasted barely ten years.
Details of the exhibition can be found here.
Photo: Peter Henry Emerson (1856-1936); Poling the Marsh Hay; 1886.
Platinum printfrom a silver gelatin bromide glass negative H. 23,2; W. 29,1 cm
Paris, musée d'Orsay
The photo-historian Larry Schaaf writes in the The Magazine Antiques about the institutional collection and preservation of photographs within the context of the British Library and it's activities. The first paragraph is reproduced below. Click here for to see the full text (for free): http://www.themagazineantiques.com/articles/libraries-and-the-preservation-of-early-photography/
When photography was first announced to the public in 1839, Louis-Jacques-Mandé Daguerre (1781–1851) took the limelight. Daguerre’s process produced a singular photograph on a silvered sheet of copper, breathtaking in its detail and seductive in its beauty. But in the larger mainstream of communication, it was a dead end. Talbot’s productions on paper seemed coarse and cumbersome by comparison. Yet paper has traditionally been the basis of many reproductive arts and is especially the province of books, allowing Talbot’s approach into existing pathways. The Library of the British Museum (as it was then) was not the logical repository of works of art, a function served by the South Kensington Museum (now the Victoria and Albert). Some photographs came in through the British Museum’s prints and drawings collection, others as part of donations of private libraries, but the truly stupendous numbers of photographs were collected contemporaneously as illustrations in books and portfolios. Since photomechanical processes were not perfected for most of the nineteenth century, many of these illustrations were original photographic prints. In many ways, we are fortunate that collections such as that of the British Library exist. They are fundamentally different from museum curated photographic collections though each has its strengths. Without this “accidental” collecting, many splendid images would either have been considered insignificant, or would not have fit the aesthetic of the moment and would have been lost to us.
http://www.themagazineantiques.com/articles/libraries-and-the-preservation-of-early-photography/
The Photographers' Gallery, London, is to close this Autumn 2010 as construction starts on the transformation of the Gallery's building on Ramillies Street, London. The conversion by architects O'Donnell+ Tuomey will create:
- Three floors of galleries
- A floor dedicated to learning for all
- An improved Bookshop and Print Sales space
- A brand new street level Café/Bar
- An accessible building with a new lift
Although the building will be closed, the Gallery will continue to present projects, talks and events in Central London, as well as working with schools and young people. The Bookshop and Print Sales teams will continue to operate over this year.
For news and regular updates join our email newsletter, the Gallery can be followed on Facebook.To find out how you can support this ambitious project contact the Development Team on campaign@photonet.org.uk, +44 (0)20 7087 9340.
Click here for more: http://www.photonet.org.uk/index.php?pid=411
executed from this negative, this work is in superb condition and has never appeared on the market before.
One of Robert Mapplethorpe’s most recognisable images, Calla Lily,1984, comes to the market with an estimate of £40,000-60,000 (lot 60) - see photo above. The sale catalogue can be found here.
So, get your wallets out before the tax raises start ........
Museum: Curator, back room, dark corner, faded shoebox.
Inside shoebox: paper-wrapped, gold-framed daguerreotype depicting Paris's Pont Neuf spanning the River Seine.
Back of frame: Handwritten with the date '1839' - the dawn of photography.
Phillip Prodger, the first full-time photography curator at the PeabodyEssex Museum, knew right away he was onto something special. Now, with the help of a Harvard conservator, he’s working to find out whether the print could have been taken by Louis Daguerre himself. If so, the 4-by-6 1/2-inch image could be worth upwards of $3 million. The picture itself is not signed. On the back of the frame, a label names the shop of Vincent Chevalier, the Paris optician who made Daguerre’s camera lenses. It’s unclear who took the photograph.
In fact, no more than 20 daguerreotypes are known to exist from that year. The Metropolitan Museum of Art has nothing dating to 1839. Boston’s Museum of Fine Arts has a daguerreotype from 1840.
“It’s quite early, and it’s an outdoor scene in Paris, reportedly in good condition, by someone who is quite well known,’’ said Laura Paterson, a specialist in the photographs department at Christie’s auction house. “All of these things add enormous value. It sounds as if they have a rare find on their hands. It’s of immense historical importance.’’
So how did such a valuable art object end up in a shoebox? To begin with, the museum dates to 1799, meaning an immense amount of jumbled materials came into its possession well before modern collection policies and records were in place. A man named John Burley bought the daguerreotype in 1842 in Paris and later gave it to the museum.
To follow the detective trail with Inspector Clouseau, read the full report here.
Mr Nickels, who died aged 80 in 2000, spent a lifetime amassing hundreds of glass negatives, photographs and postcards that were almost thrown out. The entire collection was bought for £2,800 by the Omnibus Society to secure it as an archive, rather than it 'lost'
Photos: The collection of photographic negatives was nearly thrown out after Mr Nickels' death.
As an anthropologist and statistician, Francis Galton embarked on a photographic mission in the late 1870s to produce “portraiture of the invisible.” Instead of making photographs of individual objects or things observable to the eye, Galton aimed to create photographs of ideas and concepts that encompassed all individuals within that class.
If you are a follower of his work, then there is a lecture on Galton's photographic work entitled "The Monstrous, the Meaningless, and Margins of Error", details of which can be found here.
