| A new web site "Albumen Photographs: History,
Science and Preservation" is now online at http://albumen.stanford.edu. The site features 19th
century primary source materials, contemporary research, a gallery,
and video of albumen print manufacture. In addition, there is an
interactive treatment forum for conservators to discuss preservation
issues pertaining to albumen photographs. The site will be of
interest to students, historians, scientists, curators, collection
managers, and conservators.
The site was created through a partnership of art conservators
backed by institutional support. Private conservators Timothy Vitale and Paul Messier conceived the site, secured its
institutional backing and prepared much of the original content
text, graphics and video. Walter Henry,
Acting Head of Media Preservation, Stanford University Libraries,
digitized most of the site's articles into HTML and serves as
webmaster. John Burke, Chief Conservator,
Oakland Museum of California, designed the graphical user interface
and did most of the Perl and Javascript programming. The project was
funded through a grant received from the National Center for Preservation
Technology and Training. The site is hosted and maintained by
the Stanford University
Libraries. The nearly two-year project was sponsored by the Monterey Museum of Art under
the direction of Richard Gadd.
The site is organized into the following key sections: Library, Science,
Technology, Gallery, Video
Clips and Treatment Forum.
The Library contains primary
source material for the study of albumen prints with special
emphasis on history, methods of manufacture, science and
preservation. There are nearly 150 19th and 20th century articles
and four complete monographs. Among the articles are significant
19th century works by Louis-Désiré Blanquart-Evrard,
Mathew Carey Lea, Gustav LeGray, Oscar Rejlander and Henry Peach Robinson. The
primary focus of the 20th century articles is preservation with
notable articles by Valerie
Baas, Klaus
Hendricks, Paul
Messier, James
Reilly and Timothy
Vitale. Monographs from the 19th century include Désiré van
Monckhoven's A Popular Treatise
on Photography (1863) and John Towler's The Silver
Sunbeam (1864). The 20th century monographs are Robert
Sobieszek's British Masters of
the Albumen Print (1976) and James Reilly's The Albumen Salted
Paper Book (1980). The Library is organized into
twenty-three topics such as "Aesthetics," "Albumen Preparation," "Fixing and Washing" and "Conservation Research." Each topic
has a narrative introduction. Each item in the library was converted
into html, allowing keyword searches of
all text. Paul Messier gathered many of the 19th century articles,
designed the organizational structure of the library, secured
necessary permissions and wrote the topic headings. Walter Henry
digitized each article and monograph and wrote code to bind the
library together and insure that it is maintained into the future.
The section on Science provides
a short, non-technical summary of the materials science research
performed by Timothy Vitale and Paul Messier at the Smithsonian's
Conservation Analytical Laboratory through the years 1990 and 1992.
The essay discusses the results of the treatment-based research,
which showed that cracking in the albumen layer can be increased
during water-based conservation treatments. In addition, the essay
shows how the mechanical and physical properties of albumen govern
this response to water and suggests how future research might focus
on wetting and drying rates to control the negative effects of
aqueous treatment.
The Technology section
presents a synthesis describing how albumen printing fits into a
historical context as an imaging medium. Key technical developments
are described giving insight into how albumen photography became the
dominant imaging medium for much of the 19th century. This section
features extensive hyperlinked references to primary source material
in the Library. The essays in the Scienceand
Technology sections were written and illustrated by Timothy
Vitale.
The Gallery currently contains
five exhibitions with thumbnails linked to nearly 150 medium and
high resolution JPEG images. The exhibitions are:
Paul Messier prepared the design and layout of the Gallery. Tim
Vitale worked to develop the exhibitions and, notably, scanned and
digitally restored the faded microfiche originally used to
illustrate the British Master's monograph. The Gallery
will continue to accept additional online exhibitions pertaining to
albumen printing.
The site contains numerous Video
Clips that illustrate the process of making albumen prints.
The video shows master albumen printer Doug Munson of the Chicago Albumen Works
working through each step of the
process, from
breaking eggs and separating the yolks to sensitizing
the sheet and then on to exposure, toning and mounting. Each video
clip is narrated by Munson and is linked to articles dealing with
the various steps in the Library. Each clip runs for about 15-60
seconds. Timothy Vitale and Paul Messier shot the video using two
Sony VX 1000 (miniDV) cameras. Timothy Vitale edited the clips and
prepared them for presentation on the web using Apple Final Cut Pro
1.2.5 and Terran MediaCleaner EZ to render QuickTime movies. The
site also contains video documenting an albumen print wetting and drying experiment
using the environmental scanning electron microscope (ESEM)
performed by Paul Messier and Timothy Vitale in 1991.
The Treatment Forum provides a
vehicle for conservators to exchange information pertaining to the
conservation treatment of albumen photographs. Modeled in part on
the the Conservation Catalogs published by the Photographic
Materials and the Book and Paper specialty groups of the American Institute for
Conservation, the Treatment Forum allows photography
conservators to provide their objective assessments of the various
materials and techniques used in the course of a conservation
treatment. The interchange of ideas within the Treatment Forum is
accessible to all users while actual contributions to the Forum are
limited to practicing conservators. In large part, the Treatment
Forum is based on Timothy Vitale's work on the original Paper
Conservation Catalog. The Forum utilizes DiscusWare Discus, a
WWW discussion board application. Through Perl programming, John
Burke customized the Discus application to better fit the needs of
the Treatment Forum.
The authors are committed to developing the site over time,
making it a truly comprehensive resource for scholars from various
disciplines. Additions to the site are welcome. It is hoped that the
"Albumen Photographs: History, Science and Preservation"will
serve as a model for additional sites dealing with the history and
preservation of photographic materials. |
