![Photograph - Photographic Study [Carpenter at his work-bench, Dundrum]](http://media.vam.ac.uk/media/thira/collection_images/2008BT/2008BT8481_jpg_ds.jpg "Photograph - Photographic Study [Carpenter at his work-bench, Dundrum]")
-
Photographic Study [Carpenter at his work-bench, Dundrum]
Clementina, Lady Hawarden, born 1822 - died 1865 - Enlarge image
Photographic Study [Carpenter at his work-bench, Dundrum]
- Object:
Photograph
- Place of origin:
Dundrum (photographed)
- Date:
ca.1858-61 (photographed)
- Artist/Maker:
Clementina, Lady Hawarden, born 1822 - died 1865 (photographer)
- Materials and Techniques:
Photograph
- Credit Line:
Given by Lady Clementina Tottenham
- Museum number:
PH.457:174-1968
- Gallery location:
Prints & Drawings Study Room, level H, case X, shelf 33H, box XI
Photographs of workers are rare in early photography. William Henry Fox Talbot (1800-77) created an exemplary documentary series on his Lacock Abbey estate in the 1840s. Lady Hawarden made a number of photographs of workers on her husband's estate at Dundrum, Co. Tipperary. Even this work, however, follows Hawarden's characteristic interest in dramatic light effects: the intense light on the carpenter's apron (in comparison to the relatively dark interior) results in halation. A blaze of light spreads from the white fabric of the apron. Nonetheless, the photograph is also a rare and useful view of the working clothes of an estate servant in Ireland around 1860.
