Faces forward to the past

25 March - 23 May 2010

In celebration of the 120^th Anniversary of the founding of the Richmond and Twickenham Photographic Society, the Orleans House Gallery is exhibiting a collection of work by the Society, which explores the fusion of printing processes available 1890 with digital photography. The main part of the exhibition is a panel of strong, and sometimes stark, portraits printed using the old gum bichromate process from digitally-printed negatives.

Since its first meeting on 3^rd July 1890 in the Railway Inn in the centre of Richmond, the RTPS, as it is often known, has been enjoying and promoting the art and science of all aspects photography. Many of the processes used very expertly in those days, though rare, are still alive and practiced today: platinum and palladium printing, Van Dyke brown and the ‘blue-print' cyanotype. In the early days of photography the necessary ultra-violet light came directly from the sun while, of course, today many sources of UV can be and are used. But UV requires contact printing, resulting in prints the same size as the negatives, and in the days of 35mm film these techniques lost their appeal. However, some members of the RTPS are at the forefront of using digital technologies to produce negatives limited in size only by the width of the printer.

Using this hybrid of techniques the members of RTPS have produced startling new work, including many prints that explore complete new slants to the old photographic processes, in particular gum bichromate printing. The panel of gum print portraits by Edward Draper, the current President, that give this exhibition its title use exquisite watercolour paper the sheets hand-prepared  specifically for each print. Edward often physically cuts out the subject from the negative to enhance the image and thus brings vitality and strength to his pictures. A technique that has been described as "exciting and utterly new to this old form photographic printing" by Randall Webb, author of Spirits of Salts: a working guide to old photographic processes.

A second panel printed with similarly inventive techniques cleverly supports these portraits - gum prints of regions of the body such as hands and legs that have an almost stony quality that is challenging and highly evocative. The final panel is devoted to work that explore many of the other alternative photographic printing processes including: platinum printing, cyanotype, carbon printing and van Dyke brown.

Gallery open:

Tuesday - Saturday 1.00 - 4.30pm

Sundays 2.00 - 4.30pm

Phone 020 8831 6000

From April 1^st the gallery will close at 5.30pm

For More Information about the exhibition, please visit  or Gumprint

Or

Contact Orleans House Gallery, the Arts Service of London Borough of Richmond Upon Thames at tel: 020 8831 6000

Email: artsinfo@richmond.gov.uk