Fox Talbot: Dawn of the Photograph

Super exhibition at the Science Museum looking at the life and work of one of the inventors of photography, Fox Talbot.

It was fascinating to see his sketch book from Italy where he used a type of camera obscurer to compose the images and started to think about how you might capture the image directly onto paper rather than drawing it. The section on about his house, Lacock Abbey, and the images it appeared in was really interesting and I particularly  like the pictures of the lattice windows and the rocking horse, Firefoot. 

It was wonderful that a large picture of Holyrood House by Fox Talobot’s great rival Daguerre. I’d never seen a painting by him and it was all about light and shade. There was a large section on the various books he published with originals of the photographs used as well as looking at how they were used in the books.

I was most intrigued by his valet and assistant Nicolaas Henneman who set up a print workshop in Reading to mass produce Fox Talbots work and ended up running a rooming house. I’ve since found out that Ruskin made his valets learn about developing photographs. Was this a Victorian thing?

Closes on 11 September 2016.

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