Photograph by David Octavius Hill and Robert Adamson, 'Portrait of William Etty R.A.', salted paper print from calotype negative, ca. 1844

Profile of William Etty R.A. sitting on a chair, holding a palette and paintbrushes.

Transferred from the British Museum

This photograph was acquired by the British Museum in 1857 than transferred in 2000 as a plan to rationalise the collection and house objects at the V&A where greater expertise and national collections of particular media reside.

The famous partnership and collaboration between the artist David Octavius Hill and the photographer Robert Adamson came into being originally in order to produce photographic portraits to assist Hill as a painter. The team produced a wide range of superb, valuable work and they were the first consistently and successfully employ calotype process in Great Britain.

1843 Hill was introduced to Adamson and they began to collaborate on the production of calotype portraits as reference images for the painting ‘The Signing of the Deed of Demission’ which represents 474 dignitaries. Essentially, Hill posed and arranged the individual sitters or groups while Adamson attended to the technical aspects of the exposure, processing, and printing.

Some of their most powerful images, however, were made in Scottish seashore villages and depict fishermen and women. They also photographed the architecture and monument of Scotland and made calotypes of their friends posed in medieval armour or costumes.

William Etty visited Edinburgh on 16 and 17 October 1844.

E.1231-2000