Blogs

The Art Newspaper  has reviewed the Don McCullin retrospective exhibition at Tate Britain and has taken the opportunity to look at the position of photography in Britain's principal museum. It says: The Tate show symbolises a shift in photography’s significance in British museums, and not just because the Tate is correcting its historic disregard. Last year, the V&A opened phase one of its Photography Centre, an expanded permanent space for photography. Despite collecting photography since its earliest years in the mid-19th century, the museum had waited until 1998 before assigning it a dedicated space. There are vast photographic collections at the Imperial War Museums in London and Manchester, and at the National Portrait Gallery (NPG). At the NPG, in particular, there has been an increasing volume of (often extremely popular) photography exhibitions over the past decade.

Read the full piece here

With the introduction of photography in the 19th century, printers no longer had to transfer the image manually onto the printing surface, but were offered the possibility to transfer the image by sensitizing the printing surface and exposing it to light, through a negative or positive depending on the printing technique.

With computer technology, negative or positive film is often no longer necessary. The image is transformed into dots by the computer and the image is transferred to the printing surface by light exposure in the machine.

Since their invention photomechanical printing techniques have continued to develop further. There are many similar variations of the same technique, each named differently by its inventor. This can be very confusing in the process of identification.

In this seminar the most important photomechanical techniques of relief, intaglio, planographic, screen and digital prints will be presented.

The different techniques (artistic and reproduction) will be examined by studying original prints under magnification. Two participants will share a stereomicroscope. The distinctive characteristics of each technique will be worked out through closely looking at the original prints, and exercises in identification.

The two day course provides an opportunity to look at a great number and variety of original prints and to develop skills in the identification of their techniques. There will also be the opportunity to compare photomechanical with manual prints.

Registration requests should be sent to: hombu@freenet.de

Hildegard Homburger, Papierrestaurierung, 10555 Berlin, Germany

Tel: +49 30 3912503

Seminar: Identification of photomechanical prints
June 13-14, 2019 at Papierrestaurierung Hildegard Homburger, 10555 Berlin, Germany
Hosted by Hildegard Homburger in cooperation with the Internationale Arbeitsgemeinschaft der Archiv- Buch- und Grafikrestauratoren

www.iada-home.org 

The language of the seminar will be English.

Maximum participants: 8

Costs: 335 Euro or 290 Euro for IADA-members

See: http://www.hildegard-homburger.de/photomechanisch1.html

Why print a photograph in 2019? We are witnessing the historic transformation of photography from tangible objects—prints, plates, and negatives—to code: intangible bits, bytes, and pixels. As the tether between visual culture and the material world is recalibrated every day, a new form of literacy is required to draw meaning from physical media and its obsolescence. At the very moment when characterization and interpretation of the printed photograph is rapidly gaining ground, the momentum toward dematerialization raises the issue of the long-term relevance and sustainability of photography as a material fact. Does the physical photograph still matter today—as a source for teaching, learning, and scholarship—and will it matter into the future?

This three-day program is organized by Paul Messier, Director of the Lens Media Lab at Yale’s Institute for the Preservation of Cultural Heritage; Monica Bravo, Assistant Professor of History and Theory of Photographic Media at California College of the Arts; and colleagues at Yale University with the support and guidance of the FAIC Collaborative Workshops in Photograph Conservation advisory committee. The program and elective seminars will be geared for educators, students, curators, photographers and, particularly, for conservators whose core value proposition is most directly tied to the physical photograph. Insights from conservators, scholars, makers, and the art market will address the premise that physical photography is a closed set. The optional final day of the workshop will model interdisciplinary inquiry and seek to incubate collaborations focused on photography as a medium both material and immaterial.  New tools will be examined for characterizing and contextualizing the photograph both as object and disembodied image.

September 23 -25, 2019
Yale University, New Haven, CT
A Collaborative Workshop in Photograph Conservation

See more here: https://learning.conservation-us.org/p/material-immaterial#tab-product_tab_overview

Roddy Simpson, photographer and University of Glasgow honorary research fellow in the school of culture and creative arts has published a blog on Elizabeth Johnston Hall (1822-1901). Hall was one of the most famous photographed Scottish women because of the image of her produced in the mid-1840s by the pioneering Scottish partnership of David Octavius Hill (1802-70) and Robert Adamson. 

Read the full blog here: https://universityofglasgowlibrary.wordpress.com/2019/02/01/early-photography-elizabeth-johnston-hall-1822-1901/

Image: Elizabeth Johnston Hall by Hill and Adamson. Carbon print by Jessie Bertram 1916. University of Glasgow Library, Special Collections Dougan Add. 40

Those of us with an interest in British cameras will know the Ensign Multex as an interesting and collectable camera from the late 1930s.  It is unusual in being a 14 on 127 camera with a coupled rangefinder focussing down to 21 inches.  

Launched in 1936 as “The British Precision Miniature Camera” it moved quickly through 3 variants (Model I, Model II and Model 0 in that order) in less than 3 years and then disappeared.

I am in the middle of a project to try to understand the development of this intriguing camera across its variants and I would appreciate any help readers can give me.  My aim is to report back via a comprehensive article in Photographica World later this year.

There are two ways in which you may be able to help me.  If you own a Multex, I have produced a survey document to help me to gather data on the production run.  I can send this to you by email.  Secondly, I would appreciate details or copies of any adverts or publicity material you may have access to which refers explicitly to the Multex Model 0.  This appears to be the most common model amongst collectors, but I have not found any advertising which mentions it.

You will learn how to create exquisite, unique handmade prints on art paper. Make photograms from leaves & objects and/or images using your own photos. Book now so we can create your negs in time for the class. There will also be the opportunity to try toning, to create a wonderful range of different looks!

Darkroom workshops are led by Catriona Gray and are in small groups to maximise the learning experience.

All materials included. Cost £60

Darkroom London, Unit 10, Burmarsh Workshops, 71 Marsden Street, London, NW5 3JA

See more and book here: https://www.darkroomlondon.org/alternative-processes-cyanotypes/van-dyke-brown/polaroid-lift/lumen-prints/

The Royal Collection Trust has a number of upcoming events related to the exhibition Shadows of War: Roger Fenton’s Photographs of the Crimea, 1855 at the Queen's Gallery, London:  

Creative course: Photography in Focus

Saturday, 9 – Sunday, 10 February, 10:00 – 17:00, £175

Enhance your photography skills on this two-day course led by award-winning British Army photographer Rupert Frere. Learn the theory behind taking a good photograph using Fenton's and Frere's own photographs as inspiration, before taking your new-found skills out into the heart of London under the supervision of your tutor. This course will improve your confidence, creativity, composition and help you find your photographic voice.

Book here: https://www.rct.uk/whatson/event/912681/Creative-course:-Photography-in-focus

Lecture: Roger Fenton: The First War Photographer

Wednesday, 20 March, 13:00–14:00, free with an exhibition ticket

Join Sophie Gordon, Head of Photographs, as she discusses Roger Fenton's photographs of the Crimean War, taken in 1855. The lecture will look at the commercial motivations behind Fenton's work and the public display of the photographs across Britain in 1855–6. It will also highlight the emotional content of this pioneering photography by comparing his images with the work of other Crimean War photographers.

Book here: https://www.rct.uk/whatson/event/912693/Roger-Fenton:-First-war-photographer

and at Windsor Castle:

Evening lecture: Crown and Camera: A Victorian Passion for Photography

Wednesday, 13 March, 18:30 – 20:00, £15

Queen Victoria and Prince Albert were fascinated by photography from a very early date. Catlin Langford, Assistant Curator at Royal Collection Trust, considers the wide range of photography they commissioned and collected that provides us with a unique glimpse into their passions, beliefs and private family life.

https://www.rct.uk/whatson/event/912396/Crown-and-camera:-A-Victorian-passion-for-photography

Images: top: © Rupert Frere; middle and lower: Royal Collection Trust / © Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II 2019.

The archive of British photographer Daniel Meadows was acquired by the Bodleian Library in March 2018. It had been at the Library of Birmingham from 2014-2018. Northern Narratives, working in partnership with Daniel Meadows and The Bodleian Library, is developing an exhibition drawn from Meadows' substantial archive which will tour to a number of international galleries throughout 2020-21. Dates and venues will be announced in Autumn 2019. The exhibition will be supported by a new book published by the library. 

Meadows' archive was assembled over nearly five decades.  It contains his life's work — all the negatives and contact sheets associated with his photo-documentary work also a great many contextualising documents including posters, magazines, books, receipts, newsletters, notebooks, diaries, audio tapes, digital stories, his PhD document and research material, and much correspondence besides. It is housed in the Bodleian's Weston Library and at the time of writing accessioning is currently underway with its catalogue being mapped onto the Bodleian's own so that, from 2019, it can be made available online. 

See: https://www.photobus.co.uk/the-archive/#LoB

https://www.northernnarratives.org/

https://www.bjp-online.com/2014/08/daniel-meadows-at-the-library-of-birmingham/

At a special event on 31 January 2019 Richard Ovenden, Bodley’s librarian, marked the conclusion of a six-year project to produce the William Henry Fox Talbot Catalogue Raisonné Project which commenced in earnest in 2016. The project has transferred the records of the world’s leading Talbot scholar Professor Larry J Schaaf on to a searchable, illustrated, database. It has set a model for future online catalogues raisonné.  At the time of writing it features some 18,177 records, plus a supporting blog and contextual texts.  

The conclusion was marked by two lectures and a panel discussion from Dr Kelley Wilder of De Montfort University and Malcolm Daniel of the Houston Museum of Fine Arts.  Hans P Kraus Jr paid tribute to, and spoke on behalf of, Schaaf who was unable to attend the event.

Ovenden similarly paid fulsome tribute to Schaaf without whom the project would have not been realised and noted that, although the funding for it had ended, Schaaf had agreed to continue to support and enhance the data records. He also highlighted the fact that ‘photography is now at the heart of Bodleian Library’. The library acquired the Talbot archive from Lacock Abbey and has been actively developing its photography holdings. 

The archive of British photographer Daniel Meadows was transferred from Library of Birmingham to the Bodleian Library in March 2018. Northern Narratives, working in partnership with Daniel Meadows and The Bodleian Library, is developing an exhibition drawn from Meadows' substantial archive which will tour to a number of international galleries throughout 2020/21. Dates and venues will be announced in Autumn 2019.

See:  https://talbot.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/