John Hannavy

An interesting book from an author known for his love of the history of photography. Early photographic processes - waxed paper, wet and dry collodion in particular - were cumbersome, as negative materials needed to be coated with the light-sensitive emulsion immediately before exposure and often needed to be developed immediately after exposure. Early Victorian photographers therefore had to travel with massive amounts of paraphernalia in order to actually make photographs, including 'dark tents' to enable plates to be coated and photographs developed literally "in the field".

In view of that, it's surprising how many photographs we have from the period 1830-60 taken out of doors. More remarkable still are the numbers of photographs taken as part of photographic expeditions to far-flung corners of the globe (although it has to be said that any photographic trip of more than a day was a major undertaking under those circumstances). Victorian photographers toured Egypt, India and China (amongst other places). John Hannavy hit on the idea of retracing some of those expeditions with modern cameras, trying to recreate some of the scenes from those early pictures and reflecting on the changes in both the photographer's craft and the life of the subjects that were captured.

The result is an interesting essay in comparisons. Hannavy's writing style is easy and journalistic, without being trite or facile. The contemporary photographs are all of a high standard; interestingly, most of them were taken on transparency stock, with only a few of the last trip being sourced on a top-end digital camera. No noticeable difference can be discerned, showing that the book is also a top-end production.… (mais)