Blogs

The work of photographer Frank Hurley is used on eight new stamps being issued by the Royal Mail on 7 January 2016. The set is being issued to commemorate Ernest Shackleton's polar voyage of 1914-1916. Shackleton's ship Endurance became stuck in ice and Shackleton with six companions then braved a voyage of 720 nautical miles in an open boat to the whaling stations of South Georgia to get help for his crew. They were finally rescued in August 1916.

The stamps' images have been created from the original glass photographic plates held by the Scott Polar Research Institute, Cambridge, and the Royal Geographical Society, London, and taken by Hurley.   the Mint Stamps feature eight scenes captured by pioneering photographer Frank Hurley. The subjects are: Entering the Antarctic Ice 1st Class, Endurance Frozen in Pack Ice 1st Class, Striving to Free Endurance £1.00, Trapped in a Pressure Crack £1.00, Patience Camp £1.33, Safe Arrival at Elephant Island £1.33, Setting Out for South Georgia £1.52, and Rescue of Endurance Crew £1.52

See more here 

The Historical Group of The Royal Photographic Society has arranged another of its popular - and useful - Research Days on Saturday, 9 January 2016 at the School of Arts, Birkbeck, University of London. The day will consist of more than twelve speakers presenting short papers about their research and work in progress. Topics range from Arthur Marshall, Isabella Bird and George Washington Wilson, to Simla and daguerreotypy amongst many others. 

The day will be of interest to anyone interested in researching photographic history, students and genealogists.  Places are limited. To book a place click here: http://www.rps.org/events/2016/january/09/research-day

This new publication by Steven F Joseph is the first comprehensive and richly illustrated overview of historical Belgian photographic literature. It presents comprehensive survey of both of illustrated books and of technical publications. It makes a major contribution to academic study in the field, with a corpus composed of 681 entries and, for each title, indicates locations of surviving copies in institutional collections in Belgium and elsewhere. An introductory essay plots the development of photographic publishing in Belgium, making full use of primary and secondary sources. An album of over eighty images draws on the rich iconography of early Belgian photographic literature, most reprinted for the first time. It is published in English and French. 

440 pages, €69,50, published by Leuven University Press. 

For more information, including a full table of contents and sample pages see: http://upers.kuleuven.be/en/book/9789462700475

The Manfred & Hanna Heiting Fonds / Rijksmuseum Fonds enables the Rijksmuseum to annually award two postgraduate Fellowships that stimulate outstanding object-based, photo-historical research by prospective curators from the Netherlands or abroad.

Fellowships are awarded for a six-month period. The focus of research should be related to the National Photo Collection held by the Rijksmuseum’s Print Room. The Rijksmuseum will endeavor to enable publication of the Fellow’s research. This could be an in-depth study of one photograph or photo book and/or its distribution; on a series of photographs or part of an oeuvre; on the aesthetic or technical aspects of photography; on the wider context of a photo book or album; or on combinations of art-historical research and research on materials and techniques. 

The Rijksmuseum Fellowship Programme
As part of the Rijksmuseum Fellowship Programme, the Manfred & Hanna Heiting Fellowship is set out to train a new generation of museum professionals: inquisitive object-based specialists who will further develop understanding of Netherlandish art and history for the future. The Rijksmuseum will provide working space for the Fellows, in order to stimulate an exchange of knowledge, ideas and experience. Access will be provided to all necessary information in the museum, as well as to the library and the resources of the Netherlands Institute for Art History (RKD) in The Hague.

Application and procedure
The closing date for all applications is 13 March 2016, at 6:00 p.m. (Amsterdam time/CET). Selection will be made by an international committee in April 2016. The committee consists of eminent scholars in the relevant fields of study from European universities and institutions, and members of the curatorial staff of the Rijksmuseum. Applicants will be notified by 1 May 2016. All Fellowships will start in September 2016.

For further information click here. 

The V&A Photographs department will be producing a display in Gallery 38A titled: The Camera Exposed. It will explore themes around the presence of ‘the camera’, or some trace of it, in photographs. Spanning the history of photography, the display will present works that explore this theme different ways, from photographers’ self-portraits with their cameras to more conceptual pieces. Artists featured include Charles Thurston Thompson, Lady Hawarden, Bill Brandt, Richard Avedon and Henri Cartier-Bresson.

Image: Charles Thurston Thompson, ‘Venetian mirror circa 1700, from the collection of Mr. John Webb’, 1853

Bronwen Colquhoun, Assistant Curator of Photography at the V&A, London, is leaving to take up the recently advertised post of Senior Curator of Photography at the National Museum of Wales in February 2016. The role was noted on BPH in October - click here to see the job description. Bron has been with the Photographs Department since 2012.

Her PhD, which she was awarded earlier this year from Newcastle University, examined how photo-sharing website, Flickr The Commons, supports community engagement and builds new knowledge and meaning around historic photographic collections.

She has previously worked at the Library of Congress, Northern Gallery for Contemporary Art, English Heritage and volunteered at the National Media Museum. 

I am looking for information about an early image of the Rosetta Stone. Here is an albumen print by Mansell & Co., presumably from the 1870's. However it is not an image of the stone itself, but some sort of graphic image- a lithograph, a rubbing?  I know that such images were made as early as 1800, but can find no information about this particular graphic  Is it still in existence? In the British Museum?  The top left corner seems to have been cut off at some point. 

The exact same graphic appears in a remarkable Daguerreotype by Mayall, from the Thomas Harris Collection in New York. That Dag was exhibited in 1847, so the image was around for a while. It even seems darker in the Mansell albumen, but that may just be the fading.

Any information would be appreciated,

Thanks, David

The Science Museum is to present a major exhibition exploring the work of British photography pioneer William Henry Fox Talbot. Fox Talbot: Dawn of the Photograph, which opens in the Museum’s Media Space in April, will present the birth of photography in Britain within its industrial and social context, and reveal the extent of Talbot’s remarkable experiments as the figurehead of a new and influential medium that changed the way people saw themselves and the world.

The Science Museum Group, as custodians of the world’s most comprehensive and important collection of work by William Henry Fox Talbot, is uniquely placed to tell the story of how photography was borne out of a 19th century desire to experiment with emerging ideas and technologies. Photography was one of many fields in which Talbot was working, but it was his invention of the negative-positive process which formed the basis of photography around the world for over 150 years, that immortalised him as the father of the medium.

Five years after making his discovery public he published The Pencil of Nature, the first commercial publication to be illustrated using photographs. Alongside his artistic and scientific aspirations for the medium, Talbot had one eye on its commercial potential. The exhibition is a testament to Talbot’s magical and industrial visions for his invention, ranging from the delicate capture of natural specimens to functional ambitions for photography as a means of mass production.

In 1934, Talbot’s granddaughter Matilda organised an exhibition marking the centenary of his first photographic experiments at Lacock Abbey, the site of production for what is considered to be the earliest photographic negative - the latticed window - taken using an improvised ‘mousetrap’ camera. Shortly after this exhibition, approximately 6,500 items were transferred from Talbot’s former home to the Science Museum so that his unique and valuable works, including some incredibly fragile items, could be preserved for the nation. Some of the earliest examples of his processes will be displayed for the first time in this exhibition.

Russell Roberts, co-curator and Reader in Photography at the University of South Wales said: ‘Photography without question was one of the most profound inventions of 19th century Britain. Talbot not only set in motion a new way of seeing but, through his writings and experiments, identified the distinctiveness of photography as an art, science and industry. He left an extensive visual record of the medium’s possibilities that reveals a sophisticated consciousness at work. This exhibition allows us to fully appreciate the extent of his achievements and to reinforce the impact of his invention on social and cultural life.’

Greg Hobson, co-curator and Curator of Photographs, National Media Museum said: ‘William Henry Fox Talbot wasn’t only one of the key figures in the invention of photography; he anticipated its uses and usefulness with intelligence and a vision for its critical role in modernity. It is a delight to be able to examine these significant contributions through our remarkable holdings in the National Photography Collection.'

Fox Talbot: Dawn of the Photograph explores how the work of this pioneer bridged art, science and industry to define what was possible in the formative moments of photography. The Science Museum’s industrial collections will complement the early Talbot work in the exhibition. They will situate Talbot’s experiments in the context of other contemporary innovations and set the scene for how people shared ideas at the time.

The exhibition also explores the relationships between a network of photographers who gravitated towards Talbot’s process but who each took photography into different territory. Assessing their artistic contribution and social legacy, it reflects on how enthusiasm for photography was initially limited to a small close-knit, elite group of people.

Towards the end of the exhibition, the work of Talbot’s contemporaries including Anna Atkins, Hill and Adamson, and Calvert Jones will be displayed in an exploration of how technology, techniques and practices were shared or inspired others in different parts of the country to a variety of ends.

Fox Talbot: Dawn of the Photography
14 April – 11 September 2016, Media Space, Science Museum, London
Admission £8, Seniors £7, Concessions £6 (prices include donation)

William Henry Fox Talbot, a special catalogue published to accompany the exhibition will feature 100 high-quality reproductions of Talbot’s work, RRP £27.95.

For more about the exhibition, visit www.sciencemuseum.org.uk/foxtalbot

Call for Papers is now open for the upcoming ICOM-CC (Conservation committee) Photographic Materials Working Group Interim Meeting, to be held at the Rijksmuseum Amsterdam 21-24 September 2016. The theme of the meeting is: Uniques and Multiples.

Please follow the link below to find all details related to the Call for Papers and the meeting itself. The deadline for submitting abstracts is January 15, 2016. The Technical Committee looks forward to your abstracts and your participation in the meeting!

https://www.rijksmuseum.nl/en/icom-cc.pmwg

The email address for questions related to the conference is icom-cc.pmwg.2016@rijksmuseum.nl.

Key dates to remember:

15 January 2016   Submission deadline for abstracts for talks and posters

1 March 2016   Notification of speakers and authors

15 March 2016   Announcement of programme, Registration opens

21-22 Sept. 2016   Workshops and tours

23-24 Sept. 2016   Interim meeting

Anthropology & Photography is a new open-access publication series edited by the RAIPhotography Committee. Emerging from the international conference of the same name organized by the RAI at the British Museum in 2014, the series will highlight and make available to the widest possible audience the best new work in the field.

The RAI Photography Committee consists of: 
Elizabeth Edwards (De Montfort University)
Haidy Geismar (University College London)
Anita Herle (University of Cambridge)
Christopher Morton (University of Oxford)
Christopher Pinney (University College London)
Patrick Sutherland (University of the Arts)
Ariadne van de Ven (independent photographer)

Volume 1 Daniel Miller, Photography in the Age of Snapchat (published December 2015)

From the 1850s to the 1950s, photography was one of the most open avenues for Jews in Britain to make a living, as well as to contribute to mainstream culture. If one’s picture was snapped for a price in Britain, the person behind the lens was more than likely born a Jew. Through the 1970s, Jews were prime movers behind nearly all things photographic in Britain, including photojournalism, portrait studios, collecting, applications of photography to the fine arts, and the emergence of photography criticism and history as distinct fields. Yet despite Jews having played such remarkable roles, far out of proportion to their number and in all facets of photography, little attention has been paid to ethnic-religious difference in studies of British photography.

Richly illustrated with both color and black-and-white images, Jews and Photography in Britain is the first-ever historical investigation of this topic, ranging from the mid-nineteenth century to Queen Elizabeth’s controversial photo shoot with Annie Leibovitz in 2007. Michael Berkowitz explores subjects such as the attempts of H. W. Barnett to unsettle portrait conventions, the spectacular photo editing of Stefan Lorant, the influence of Erich Salomon on Fleet Street, the inception of the “Gernsheim Corpus” (a seminal resource for art historical research) conceived by Walter and Gertrud Gernsheim, the innovative photography practices at London’s Warburg Institute under Fritz Saxl, and the pioneering efforts at collecting and publishing about photography as history and art by Helmut and Alison Gernsheim.

Jews and Photography in Britain
Michael Berkowitz
University of Texas Press
Hardcover
392pp, 96 b&w photos
ISBN: 978-1-4773-0556-0

A FINE AND RARE PHOTOGRAPH OF IRISH POET AUBREY THOMAS DE VERE (1814-1902), who was brother in law to Sir Henry Taylor (1800-1886). Carroll had been seeking an opportunity to photograph Taylor since July 1862, and when he was invited to lunch on 3 September, he "found Mr. Taylor walking in the garden with Mr Aubrey de Vere, another poet... Settled to take over my camera on Friday." (Lewis Carroll's Dairies (1997), vol. 4, p.125).

That Friday, Carroll recorded in his diary: "about 10 went in a fly to the Taylors', and photographed until nearly 5. Took Mr Taylor himself, Mr de Vere, Aubrey, Ida and Una. As there was not time for all, I left the camera there" (ibid, p.126). The resulting photographs of de Vere and Taylor are held in the collections of Princeton University. The portrait of de Vere is identical to the one at Princeton (Album II), however the print present here is slightly larger than Princeton's and reveals a little more of the subject along the lower edge.

De Vere was also photographed by Julia Margaret Cameron, a friend of Sir Henry Taylor, who used him frequently as a model; presumably it was Taylor who acted again as the link between photographer and subject.

Click HERE to view online catalogue

Image: ALBUMEN PRINT (176 x 150mm.), the poet shown in profile seated in a chair, numbered "12Q" in the negative, 5 September 1862, East Sheen, London [Carroll image number 880]

AN ALBUM OF EARLY PHOTOGRAPHS, SOME ATTRIBUTED TO MAJOR FRANCIS GRESLEY. [C.1859-EARLY 1860S]. This album includes 15 photographs of Radley College pupils and staff taken in 1859 by an unidentified photographer, comprising 12 individual portraits (each sitter named on the mount in pencil), and 3 group photographs: the 1st VIII, the 2nd VIII, and 'The Warden and Fellows of St Peter's Radley'.

The album also contains 7 photographs taken around 1860 in and around Winterdyne House, Bewdley, Worcestershire, the owner of which was Major Francis Gresley (1807-1880), a member of the Amateur Photographic Association, and these photographs may have been taken by him. Gresley exhibited at the London Photographic Society in 1863 and 1864 and won awards. The connection between the two parts of the album are unclear, because Gresley's children did not attend Radley, however a few miles from Winterdyne is Arley Castle which was home to the Woodward family. Some of the Woodward children attended Radley, so there might be a connection.

Click HERE for e-catalogue

Harold White FRPS visited the village of Lacock in 1944 to undertake an assignment for the British Council to take photographs for a pamphlet about English village life. Followers of the British Photographic History Blog may be interest in viewing a new community web site called Lacock Unlocked where Harold White’s photographs are celebrated. 

http://www.wshc.eu/lacock/lacock-community/harold-white-and-lacock.html

This is new book that looks at the developments of motion picture film technology from a British perspective between 1895 to 2015. Renowned film historian Kevin Brownlow says: 'the book is not only unputdownable - it's heavy enough to be unpickupable!' The book will be of interest to film archivists and those interested in the technical side of film and includes chapters on How It Worked; The Film Business Gets Going; The 1920s - Time of Change; A Quest For Colour; The 1930s and 40s; New Film, New Colour, New Sound, New Screens of the 1950s and 60s; The Film Laboratory, and Slow Fade Out covering from the 1970s to 2015.

The chapters cover the very first cameras and projectors and how they worked; the development of equipment for both professional and amateur film making; colour and sound; Kodak and other manufacturer’s motion picture film stocks; how film was developed and printed at the laboratory; and cinema, non-theatric and home projection.

How Films Were Made and Shown

David Cleveland and Brian Pritchard (no relation!)
453 pages, over 900 illustrations
Price: £45 including delivery in UK, for overseas delivery, please email: brian@brianpritchard.com
and remit by Paypal to brianrpritchard@aol.com

See more about the book here. and a flyer can be downloaded here..

On the occasion of Professor Elizabeth Edwards’ retirement, the 2016 PHRC Annual International Conference will address themes from her complex and wide ranging scholarship on the cultural work of current and historical social photographic practices. Thus, Photography: Between Anthropology and History aims to showcase scholarship driven by engagements with research methodologies that informed the material and ethnographic turns in the study of photographic history, and opened up a variety of innovative critical spaces for the re/consideration of photography and its history.

We welcome applications from all disciplines and career stages, and would like to invite abstracts for 20 minute papers on topics such as, the colonial-era photographic image, photographic museum practices, photography’s printed ephemera, the sociability of photographic knowledge, its development and dynamics of exchange, and the local, national or trans-national photographic imagination. Applicants might also consider different subject matters, related but not limited to the following themes:

• Photography and anthropology
• Photography in historical studies
• Photography and geography
• Photographic collections
• Photographic ethnographies
• Photography and material culture
• Historiography of the social history of photography
• Photographic practice and social as well as technical change

Abstracts of no more than 300 words should be sent to: phrc@dmu.ac.uk by the 20 January 2016.

See more here.

The Department of History of Art at Birkbeck is expanding, and is looking to appoint internationally established scholars to help lead growth in areas of excellence. As part of this expansion, the Department invites applications for a permanent senior academic post in the History and Theory of Photography/Digital Culture. This will underpin the expansion of our current portfolio of taught programmes, research initiatives (including funded research), collaborations with external organisations and public engagement initiatives. The postholder will have expertise in the history, theories and cultures of photography and digital visual culture.

The successful candidate for this post will have a track record of internationally-recognised research, including successful grant bids as well as published work of a calibre which meets the standards of the Research Excellence Framework, and clear plans for future research. They will be able fully to contribute to undergraduate and postgraduate teaching and programme development, undertake senior administrative duties, and be prepared to work collaboratively with colleagues across the School.

About the Department

For further information about the department and, please visit the following website: http://www.bbk.ac.uk/art-history/

Further Information

Salary: Grade 9 (Senior Lecturer/Reader) of the College's London Pay Scale which is £52,780 rising to £58,939 per annum.

Carlos Relvas (1838-1894) is the best know among 19^th Century Portuguese amateur photographers’, he was a very healthy farmer from the Ribatejo region and built his unique “Casa da Fotografia” is his hometown Golegã  (http://www.casarelvas.com/ ; ). In the not too rich panorama of Portuguese photo history he has already been the subject of a few writings[1], his studio house, a very interesting 19^th Century iron building, was subject of major works and his now a museum.

The last published, and most likely the deepest study is Uma Família de Fotógrafos, Carlos e Margarida Relvas, written, as a MA thesis by Cátia Salvado Fonseca, and published by Chiado Editora. In his writing Cátia Fonseca underlines, for the first time, the work of Carlos Relvas daughter, Margarida Relvas, justifying the title of the book. In the past there was even the idea that Margarida Relvas name was only used as vehicle to the presentation of photographs in contests and exhibitions. In this book Margarida Relvas (1867-1930) is clearly treated as an independent author, sometimes even opposed to Carlos Relvas, however without the importance of her father. The author emphasizes differences between the work of father and daughter. Treating Margarida Relvas as a separate author allows the author to approach upper class female education, socialization and culture, including photography as a part of it.

Carlos Relvas was an amateur whose work covered most fields for 19^th Century photography. The better known are the portraits, quite similar to portraits made at the same time by professional studio photographers, his subjects range from peasants to the Royal Family.  Some photographs represented ethnic types with Portuguese folk costumes; however these are mostly studio acted photographs using his employees, friend and himself. His passion for horses and bullfights produced another large number of photographs. And there are of course the usual landscapes and countryside scenes, many of Ribatejo, where he lived. Photographing art works may not be considered too creative, but was an important and highly regarded branch of 19^th century photography, even for an amateur, Carlos Relvas made an important work on this area. He had the kind of photographic output only attainable to the very wealthy, using all the latest materials and processes, but also having a paid worker to help him with photography.

Relvas was highly regarded among European 19^th century photographers participating in exhibitions and contests, he was also rather well known in Portugal with publications on the most important Portuguese press of his time. However his work remains unknown internationally, and does not even get a footnote on Histories of Photography.

His studio/house is built as it were a professional studio, with a waiting room, and a studio with the greatest possibilities of natural light control. It is a magnificent ironworks building, now working as a museum, a drive of just over an hour from Lisbon.

Cátia Salvado Fonseca works at Casa Museu Carlos Relvas and has a deep knowledge of Relvas work, his documentation and library. Relvas negatives were restored over a long period; unfortunately many of them were lost. Her experience is really unique, as “Casa Museu Carlos Relvas” besides the negatives still keeps Relvas cameras, as well as his darkroom. This is a wonderful visit, as well as a blessing to the researcher.    

With such a comprehensive work, spanning for three decades, published in the most influential Portuguese press, Relvas photographs are a good way of understanding Portuguese landowning bourgeoisie, as well as a general view of what were the picture worthy subjects. Portuguese royal family with almost any member being an amateur photographer may be also an interesting case study.

This new book is a good way to be aware of the work of the family Relvas. It is not as abundantly illustrated as the 2003 catalogue, but it is certainly more comprehensive on Carlos and Margarida Relvas work.

The British Journal of Photography has been digitised up to 2005 with the remainder to be completed early in 2016, BPH first reported on the project here back in 2013. The digital archive is currently only available to colleges, universities and institutional subscribers via Proquest.

The publisher of the BJP, Apptitude Media, is intending to make the digitised BJP from 1854 to the present day accessible to the wider public in 2016, although BPH understands that the charging model has yet to be determined. 

See the Proquest Art and Architecture catalogue here.

BPH will report when the BJP becomes publicly available but in the meantime from its January 2016 issue the BJP is delving in to its digital archive for a regular back page feature.