Photograph by David Octavius Hill and Robert Adamson, Elizabeth (Johnstone) Hall, 'The Beauty of Newhaven', salted paper print from calotype negative, 1843-1847

One of fifty sepia-coloured photographs of people, places and nature studies taken in Scotland and bound in album.

Given by Sir Theodore Martin, 1869

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.

The fishwives from the Scottish village of Newhaven were a compelling subject on account of their beauty, distinctive dress, strong character and heroic associations with the dangers of the sea. Other versions of this print are captioned 'It's no fish ye're buying, it's mens' lives'. This was a standard remark when stormy weather raised the price of fish. The image is one of a group of Newhaven studies made by the renowned partnership of painter David Octavius Hill and chemist Robert Adamson. Hill's artistic direction can be seen in the clever use of light, which highlights the subject against a dark background, and in the elegant composition. This is established by the position of the hands and the contrasting patterns of the striped skirt and the fish basket. Hill and Adamson used watercolour paper for both negatives and prints. Its fibres softened the image and further enhanced the painterly effect.

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