The Golden Age of British Photography, 1839-1900

New York: Aperture in association with the Victoria and Albert Museum and the Philadelphia Museum of Art, 1984. Cloth, 189 pages, illustrations; 30 cm. Photographs from the Victoria and Albert Museum, London, with selections from the Philadelphia Museum of Art, Royal Archives, Windsor Castle, The Royal Photographic Society, Bath, Science Museum, London, Scottish National Portrait Gallery, Edinburgh. Firm binding, clean inside copy. Dust jacket, with a small corner crease/front flap, protected in a mylar cover. OVERSIZE! No priority/international, except by arrangement. Profusely illustrated. "Introduced to the British public in 1839 by its inventor, William Henry Fox Talbot, photography quickly took its place-alongside explorations of new territories, discoveries in science, and expanding horizons in the arts-as an authentic wonder in an age of wonders. The Golden Age of British Photography presents photographs that represent the era, drawn from the extensive collection of the Victoria and Albert Museum and from other major museums and archives. The medium's early history unfolds in 199 images, from one of photography's first successes, Talbot's enchanting view of his breakfast table, to Paul Martin's turn-of-the-century beach scenes, the precursors of today's snapshots. Uninhibited by notions of what the new invention should be, early photographers depicted exotic faraway lands and the disappearing rural landscape, British cathedrals and London slums, the public and private faces of the time, and the newsworthy events that brought the times into view. These images, rarely seen and never before shown together, present photography at its most miraculous, its purest, and its most daring." - Publisher. CONTENTS: Preface; Introduction; The dawning of an age Chauncy Hare Townshend, eyewitness, by Mark Haworth-Booth; The daguerreotype: a new wonder, by Antoine Claudet, Philip Henry Delamotte, Horatio Ross, T. R. Williams; The calotype era: David Octavius Hill and Robert Adamson, Calvert Richard Jones, William Henry Fox Talbot, John Whistler; The circle of William Henry Fox Talbot, by Carolyn Bloore; Picturesque Britain and the industrial age: Roger Fenton, Edward Fox, Robert Howlett, John Dillwyn Llewelyn, Benjamin Brecknell Turner, Henry White; Roger Fenton and the making of a photographic establishment, by Valerie Lloyd; The grand tour: Francis Bedford, Francis Frith, Frank Mason Good, Robert Macpherson, James Robertson; High art photography: in search of an ideal: William Lake Price, Oscar G. Rejlander, Henry Peach Robinson; Exploring the empire: Samuel Bourne, Philip H. Egerton, John Murray, The Royal Engineers, Linnaeus Tripe; Aristocratic amateurs: Julia Margaret Cameron, Lewis Carroll, Clementina, Lady Hawarden; Henry Arthur Herbert, The Rossetti album, David Wilkie Wynfield; Julia Margaret Cameron: Christian pictorialist, by Mike Weaver; Street life: Thomas Annan, Henry Dixon and Alfred and John Bool, John Thomson; The art of photography: fulfilling the vision: James Craig Annan, Peter Henry Emerson, Frederick H. Evans; Peter Henry Emerson: art and solitude, by Ian Jeffrey; James Craig Annan: brave days in Glasgow, by William Buchanan; Paul Martin and the modern era.. 1st. Hardcover. Very Good/Very Good. 4to.