REPORT

Cataloguing the Institution's Photographic Collection

Emma Frater, Volunteer, December 2001

Since December 2000, I have been identifying, cataloguing and creating a database for the Institution's photographic collections. I am currently studying for an MA in Museum Studies with the University of Leicester by distance learning, and the opportunity of volunteering at the Institution meant that I could combine my life-long love of photographs and photography with my museum studies training. Care and management of collections form a large part of my studies programme.

In December 2001, I completed the database for the Lockey collection. The Reverend Francis Lockey (17961869) photographed Bath and the surrounding districts during the years 1849 to 1861. He 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.

In order to document the Lockey collection, I systematically removed each calotype from its protective archival sleeve, and placed them one at a time on a flatbed image scanner. Each calotype was scanned at 200ppi in order to record the incredible detail contained in each image. Using Extensis Portfolio database software, I have input each image's details as follows:

Filename (this is the item's accession number)

Artist (Lockey, Reverend Francis)

Medium (Calotype waxed or unwaxed)

Title (Lockey wrote the title in ink on most of his calotypes)

Subject Area (Lockey photographed landscapes and architecture)

Location (the images are of locations in and around Bath)

Dimensions (this is the height and width of the calotype, measured in millimetres)

Date (Lockey dated most of his calotypes)

Description (A detailed description of an image will help to identify it from similar images)

Keywords (this enables viewers to search for a particular subject)

The software enables a thumbnail image to be embedded in each record.

The intention is to make the Institution's photographic collections accessible to everyone by publishing them on the BRLSI website. The advantage of converting the calotypes into digital images means that the future handling of these delicate negatives will be greatly reduced. By using Paint Shop Pro software, I have been able to make a separate, positive image of each calotype.

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

1David McLaughlin and Michael Gray. Shadows and Light: Bath in Camera 1849-61, Early Rare Photographs (Monmouth Calotype: Bath, 1989), P.9.

2 Gordon Baldwin. Looking at Photographs: A Guide to Technical Terms (J. Paul Getty Museum: London, 1991), P.16.