Harry Ransom Center Online Exhibitions
The First Photograph


The Harry Ransom Center's permanant online exhibition of the First Photograph documents the creation, rediscovery, and conservation of the first image captured by Joseph Nicéphore Niépce in 1826. The image, a scene from an upstairs window, was the first to be successfully captured on a polished pewter plate sensitised with bitumen of Judea which hardens on exposure to light. After 8-10 hours of exposure, he had managed to produce the first permanant photograph from nature.

The exhibit has some good things going for it as an information source. There is an easy-to-navigate contents bar across the top of each of the 8 pages in the exhibition. The final page is a list of credits, listing the people who worked on the text, took photographs, and owners of non-HRC material. The site also explains why the real photograph object is exhibited the way it is in the HRC, how the case was constructed and other useful details. The chronology page gives readers an extended view to outline the history and provenance of the photograph from the birth of JNN to 1963. The conservation and preservation page is perhaps the most interesting, and it certainly has the best illustrations and the most technical information.

While the site serves its didactic purpose, it has severe drawbacks from an exhibition standpoint. This is due in part to the text-heavy layout (I used the word 'readers' above on purpose). Many of the images are far too small for the viewer to gain anything of substance from them. The credit section mentions no technical information on how the images were taken, how anyone else could cite or call them up in the reading room, or what resolution etc. was used in digitising the material.

Because this exhibition is just that, it is not just to condemn it for the lack of specification of technical matters, but I believe the HRC should concentrate on improving the general standard of their online exhibits. This one was put together a few years ago, and it really does show. Hopefully it can get the same update that the Beckett and Morris exhibits are currently undergoing.