The earliest surviving photograph
Delegates at the British Science Festival will be able to see what may be the earliest surviving photograph, taken not by accepted pioneers such as Daguerre or Fox Talbot, but by members of the Lunar Society, the scientific fellowship that met in late 18th century Birmingham on the night of the Full Moon.
Jon Wood of Aston University and art historian Sally Hoban say that they are keen to examine the massive archive of the Lunar Society in Birmingham Library for more evidence of early photography in the Midlands. One suggestive clue is a picture of Soho House in Birmingham, owned by Lunar Society figure Matthew Boulton, which seems to show the building as it was before alterations in the late 18th century.
This image is on paper rather than a silver plate and there is no direct knowledge of how it was produced. But Wood and Hoban think it may be a copy of a true photograph.
They also raise the possibility that a woman was among the early pioneers of photography. Elizabeth Wilkinson, a member of the Boulton family, is known as an early photographer but may also have been active in the field before 1825.
She seems to have made images with an iron-based cyanide process, producing “photogenic” drawings in which an object is placed in contact with the plate. She used this method to make images of ferns.
More intriguing is the prospect that she also used a camera obscura to make photographs as well as to copy outline images of objects.
Wood and Hoban hope that the next phase of their research will resolve a debate held in the 1860s about the nature of the “Sun Pictures” produced by the Boulton circle. Their work may show that photography was being practised in the Midlands before Daguerre and Fox Talbot got going in the 1830s.
Jon Wood of Aston University and art historian Sally Hoban say that they are keen to examine the massive archive of the Lunar Society in Birmingham Library for more evidence of early photography in the Midlands. One suggestive clue is a picture of Soho House in Birmingham, owned by Lunar Society figure Matthew Boulton, which seems to show the building as it was before alterations in the late 18th century.
This image is on paper rather than a silver plate and there is no direct knowledge of how it was produced. But Wood and Hoban think it may be a copy of a true photograph.
They also raise the possibility that a woman was among the early pioneers of photography. Elizabeth Wilkinson, a member of the Boulton family, is known as an early photographer but may also have been active in the field before 1825.
She seems to have made images with an iron-based cyanide process, producing “photogenic” drawings in which an object is placed in contact with the plate. She used this method to make images of ferns.
More intriguing is the prospect that she also used a camera obscura to make photographs as well as to copy outline images of objects.
Wood and Hoban hope that the next phase of their research will resolve a debate held in the 1860s about the nature of the “Sun Pictures” produced by the Boulton circle. Their work may show that photography was being practised in the Midlands before Daguerre and Fox Talbot got going in the 1830s.
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