19thC; Jones Calvert, Man seated on steps

A man in coat, hat and plaid waistcoat sits on the steps in the centre of this photograph. The French windows are open and the interior of the building appears dark. There is a mark above the head of the man..Bluish highlights indicate problems with fixing the image.

During the 1830s William Henry Fox Talbot invented a way of making paper negatives and from them multiple paper prints. In doing so, he laid the foundations of modern photography.

Calvert Jones learned of these developments in 1839 through a neighbour who was a cousin of Talbot. Jones lived in South Wales and he made many photographs there and in the West of England. Also, he travelled widely, making photographs on the continent. Jones' work stands out in the early development of photography because he was one of the first to apply a schooled artist's eye to photography.

Jones used these sunny steps as the location for four portraits in this album. The strong horizontal lines appear in other types of images, sometime as a scultural form and other times purely as a decorative motif. This is image one of nine small format photographs in the album. The use of strong horizontal lines appears in other images, sometimes as a sculptural form or as a decorative motif

PH.32-1983