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Vv Photographic Treasures of the California State Library Vv JBIOGRAPHIES OF PRINCIPAL PHOTOGRAPHERSj By Heather Masqueda Bradley & Thomas Houseworth & Company Eadweard J. Rulofson (1859-1880) Muybridge (1830-1904) (1863-1875) Th omas Houseworth (1828-1915), with George S. Born Edward James Muggeridge, the photographer Henry W. Bradley (1813- Lawrence (dates unknown), sailed from New York City moved from London to the United States in 1851 as 1891) and William H. to San Francisco in 1849. Th ey were headed for Cali- a commission merchant on the eastern coast. Until Rulofson (1826-1878) joined fornia, where they would work as miners and jewelers 1867—when he moved to San Francisco for good—he forces in 1863, buying out the before settling as merchants of a San Francisco optical was forced to return to England, to nurse a severe head portrait gallery of daguerreotyp- shop. In 1859 Lawrence and Houseworth began selling injury he received after being thrown from a stagecoach. ist Robert Vance to establish stereographs from their store, and displayed them in At the age of thirty-seven, Eadweard Muybridge created the photographic art gallery of Bradley & Rulofson. the windows to attract more customers. Th ey worked a name for himself, literally, as we know him today. He Th e duo worked well together; Rulofson completed with local photographers to compile a diverse collection began his career as a commercial photographer, and the managerial operations, and Bradley the curatorial of images documenting California’s major landmarks: commonly worked under the pseudonym “Helios,” the tasks. Th eir strong advertising campaign proved suc- settlements, boom towns, placer and hydraulic mining Greek God of the sun. cessful when Bradley & Rulofson won a commission operations, shipping and transportation routes, and Muybridge worked contemporary to Carleton from the United States Quartermaster General. Th e such points of scenic interest throughout northern Watkins, and often with the same subject matter. He job was to develop views of San Francisco’s defense at California and western Nevada as the Yosemite Valley desired to follow the great landscape tradition—as well Fort Alcatraz and Fort Point. Because the fi rm believed and Calaveras Redwoods. Th eir views also included an as the new trend of panoramic photography. In the the over 2,000 negatives to be sanctioned under their extensive pictorial survey of mid-nineteenth-century nineteenth century, panoramas were luxury items; they name, many prints from the series were sold. Without San Francisco. Th e prints were mass produced and were expensive to produce and only sold to a limited the permission of the War Department, which prevents sold at a reasonably low cost, making Lawrence & market. Th e views of San Francisco were made all the the distribution of any illustrations of military installa- Houseworth’s published stereographs “popular collect- more precious after the complete destruction of the tions, Bradley & Rulofson struggled with a legal scandal ibles among the middle class.”2 city in the earthquake and fi res of April 1906. His that questioned their loyalty. Ultimately, the situation Capitalizing on the growing market for stereographs, anthology of prints, Panorama of San Francisco, formed was resolved and the company took the opportunity to in 1863 Lawrence & Houseworth decided to publish a scope of the entire city, “its picturesque suburbs and rebuild their reputation. the work of many photographers under their name surrounding ranges of hills.”3 It did not take long for the team of Bradley & Rulof- and made a public eff ort to acquire an impressive set of Yosemite also fascinated the photographer, and he son to equal and even rise above their previous status, prints. Lawrence & Houseworth’s inventory grew and created many scenes of the valley with his mammoth- most likely as a result of its assertive and inventive style the fi rm soon off ered the largest collection of stereo- plate camera. During this time, Muybridge developed of business. Bradley & Rulofson bragged about their graphs on the Pacifi c Coast, competing only against a “sky shade,” a shutter-like device allowing various gallery facilities, and advertised to the public their Carleton Watkins. Th e company was always in need of exposures to be made on a single plate. Th is method “magnifi cent Reception Room, Toilet Room, Sitting new photographs to document the growth and change served to compensate for the wet plate’s over-sensitivity Room” and “Largest Sky Light in America.”1 Th e fi rm of the region, and at one point Houseworth commis- to blue light. Muybridge could then make a single nega- could also boast associations with photographers Isaiah sioned the photographer Eadweard Muybridge to make tive, instead of the combination printer’s two, and more Taber, and later Eadweard Muybridge, who left Th omas a set of mammoth plate photographs of Yosemite. accurately portray a range of tones. Meanwhile, in 1872 Houseworth & Company, at the time of their decline, In 1868 George S. Lawrence retired from the busi- Muybridge also realized his “fi rst attempts to capture to publish some Pacifi c Coast views with Bradley & ness and the fi rm was renamed Th omas Houseworth & the movement of a running horse, eff orts which would Rulofson. Company. eventually lead to Muybridge’s extensive investigations A striking blow fell upon the of animal locomotion.”4 business when the great Chicago fi re of 1871 created unredeem- able fi nancial losses. Th e two men worked together until 1877, when Bradley fi led for bank- ruptcy, and John H. Dall took his place. Upon Rulofson’s death in 1878, the company continued for some years under the name Bradley & Rulofson, unfortu- nately without the presence of either mogul. Biographies continued on inside back cover. Exhibition Catalog University Library Gallery Sacramento State University March 3 – June 24, 2006 SACRAMENTO: California State Library Foundation, 2006 JFOREWORDj teach photography courses at Sacramento State University. My interest in nineteenth century photography began when I was a student many years ago and has, over the years, informed much of my photographic work, as well as my teaching. The appreciation and study Iof great works, such as the mammoth plate albumen prints of Carleton Watkins and Eadweard Muybridge, offers a great deal to students today—close attention to craft, ambitious pictorial strategies, rich tonalities not possible with modern photographic printing materials. To this end, I have relied on the generosity of Gary Kurutz who, each year for many years now, has opened up the collection at the California State Library, one of the great artistic treasures of this community, to my students. With great enthusiasm he presents early daguerreotypes from the California Gold Rush, ambrotypes, orotones, panoramic views of pre-earthquake San Francisco, autochromes, and platinum prints. These sessions eventually became the inspiration for this show, a greatly enlarged version, chosen by Gary with a bit of help from me. It is my sincere hope that you will enjoy what is presented here as much as we have. ROGER VAIL Professor, Art Department, Sacramento State University J INTRODUCTION j he Triumph of Helios”* exhibition grew out of Professor Roger Vail’s popular class “Art and Photography.” Th e Sacramento State Table of Contents University professor felt it important for his students to understand “Tthe methods and technologies from the pioneer era. Back in the early 1980s, he approached me about bringing a class over so the students could see examples of 1 Foreword BY ROGER VAIL early photographs. Professor Vail knew that the California State Library held many vintage 2 Introduction prints including works by Carleton E. Watkins, Eadweard J. Muybridge, and other masters. BY GARY F. KURUTZ Ever since then, at least one class a year, numbering anywhere from sixty to seventy students, has visited the Library to inspect up close a Gold Rush daguerreotype or to peer through a 3 Acknowledgments stereoscope to magically see Yosemite’s Glacier Point in three-dimension. As the professor 5 Catalog of the Exhibition stressed, it is one thing to see these images reproduced in a book or projected on a screen or COMPILED BY GARY F. KURUTZ behind a glass frame, it is quite another to see them as the actual daguerreian or wet-plate photographer saw them. In this era of digital photography, both Professor Vail and I em- INSIDE Biographies of phasized the diffi culty of making a daguerreotype in the hot but gold-rich ravines of Placer COVERS Principal Photographers BY HEATHER MOSQUEDA County or the challenge of coating a 24 x 28 inch sheet of glass with light-sensitive chemicals while standing 3,000 feet above the fl oor of Yosemite Valley. In addition to showing off great 28 Glossary of Terms treasures from the Library’s rich collections, it gave me particular satisfaction to bring out examples of more obscure forms of photography such as the autochrome, orotone, glass posi- tive, and even a wedding certifi cate adorned with actual tintypes.** Th e surprise and wonder expressed by his students added to the pleasure of these evening classes held in the State Library’s California History Room. When the University opened its beautiful and spacious University Library Gallery, Professor Vail suggested mounting an exhibit of the items we had shared with his students. It was a splendid idea. Professor Phil Hitchcock, director of the Gallery and director of the School of the Arts, was equally enthusiastic and he has been most generous in working with the two of us in assembling this exhibition. In addition, I wish to acknowledge the invaluable contributions of Gerrilee Hafvenstein of the State Library’s Preservation Offi ce in preparing many of the items for display.