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Rev Lockey and his family resided in Swainswick in the house known as Swainswick Cottage. The building survives today, complete with Lockey's purpose built photographic printing studio (McLaughlin & Gray 1).
He used the calotype photographic process, which had been patented by WH Fox Talbot just a few years earlier in 1841. The calotypes are negative images, processed on writing paper, which today is quite brittle and delicate. Most of the calotypes are waxed, which improves the translucency of the negative, creates a smoother surface, and increases the detail of the negative.
The word calotype was invented by Talbot from the Greek kalos, meaning beautiful, and the Latin typus, meaning image (Baldwin 2). Each of Lockey's calotypes measures approximately 220 x 280mm. (8¾ x 11 in.)
There are 86 calotypes that were presented to the Institution in February 1933 by the Bristol and West of England Amateur Photographic Association. Other Lockey calotypes were presented to Bristol Museum and Cardiff Museum.
Some examples from the Lockey Collection
A view of Southgate Place, Broad Quay, Bath. There is a wooden cart in front of the buildings. A building on the left with the word 'SELWAYS'. A building in the centre with the words 'W MASTERS COACHMAKER'. A building on the right with the words 'NURSE'S PENNANT YARD'.
Weirs south of Argle Bridge, Bath c1853-61
A view looking along St Matthew's Place, towards Widcombe Hill. On the right hand side is the White Hart Pub with the painted signs: 'W BRETT, GENUINE HOME BREWING' and 'FAMILIES SUPPLIED WITH CASKS OF ALL SIZES'. 1853/57
Boathouse, Riverside, Nr Claverton Street, Bath c1853-61
Lansdown Proprietary College 9 May 1857
Somerset Wharf, Bath c1853-61
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A wonderful insight
"Lockey's images provide a wonderful insight into Victorian life'. His rural scenes of cottages and country houses evoke images of a romantic idyll, but he also documented street features, such as a stone water trough.
His scenes of Bath's city streets and architecture indicate his awareness of Bath as a city in transition Bellott's Hospital in Beau Street was demolished shortly afterwards in 1859 he photographed the newly built churches; their Gothic style contrasting with the existing Georgian architecture.
The Institution's photographic collections deserve to be viewed and appreciated by a wider audience, and I hope my work at the Institution will enable this to become a reality."
Emma Frater, who worked on scanning and cataloguing the Lockey negatives. Read her report.
Negative colour
The photographs on this page have been 'printed' digitally. The colour is of course, false. The colour depicted is only created by virtue of it being the 'negative' colour of the original calotypes ( which appear brown ).
Sponsor a print!
Sponsor this print: BRLSI Trustees Marie-Louise Luxemburg and Betty Suchar with one of the Lockey prints in BRLSI's Collection.
Recently Michael Gray, former curator of the Fox Talbot Museum at Lacock, offered to sell BRLSI 39 framed prints developed from the Lockey negatives now owned by the BRLSI.
These prints were exhibited at the Royal Photographic Society's gallery when it was in Milsom Street, Bath, and were so successful that they were also exhibited at Alkmaar and Braunschweig. At £25 per print and with a stock of Michael's book on Lockey thrown in for free, it was an offer we couldn't refuse.
The prints were made using traditional methods on vintage photographic paper manufactured in the 1930s. We will be exhibiting them shortly, with a series of related lectures. If we can get funding we might even take them to Bath's other twinned cities.
There is just one snag. Our budget did not allow for a chance acquisition like this, so to secure these items for our collections, Trustees Julian and Elizabeth Vincent kindly provided us with an interest-free loan.
To ensure that they are not out of pocket for too long it is now up to the rest of us to raise sufficient funds to reimburse them - so if you'd like to be the sponsor of a Lockey print, please contact the BRLSI office.
Meanwhile Shadows and Light - Bath in Camera 1849-1861, by Michael Gray and David McLaughlin, lavishly illustrated and with biographical and historical notes, is for sale at only £5 a copy. Members donating £10 or more will additionally be included in a list of sponsors which will be displayed during the exhibition and recorded in the Institution's archives. |
The Lockey Photographs
