Making History: Edinburgh 1845 (No. 42)

Description

Concerned with the advent of photography in Scotland, pioneered by Robert Adamson, who set up the first professional photographer's studio in Scotland in 1883, Matthew Withey and Rocco Lieuallen look to early examples of its usage and public perception.

Their two essays look at how the new calotype process was used to document the construction of the Scott Monument; at the partnership between Adamson and David Octavius Hill (founder member of the Royal Scottish Academy) in their project to photograph portraits of every important person frequenting intellectual and cultural life in Edinburgh at the time; and at John Steell, one of the first sculptors anywhere to have his work recorded photographically.

D.O. Hill & Robert Adamson: Chroniclers and Mythmakers
Matthew Withey

John Steell and the Links Between Photography and Sculpture
Rocco Lieuallen

This essay was written to accompany the exhibition Making History: Edinburgh 1845 (27 October 2003 - 9 February 2004, Gallery 4).