I’ve been enjoying our scientist’s fieldwork posts. We have scientist’s photographs from several historic field trips in the photography collection. My favourites are in this photo album from the 1907 Expedition to the Subantarctic Islands. The Expedition was initiated by the Canterbury Philosophical Institute with support from the Government, and studied plants, animals, soils and marine life on the Auckland… Read more »
Posts tagged with photography
Caring for our photographic negatives
We have an enormous collection of photographic negatives and transparencies on glass and film, going back to the 1870s. They include all sorts of images from studio portraits to holiday snaps, landscapes, photographs of sports teams, and artists’ negatives and transparencies. Many negatives are chemically unstable and, if left in an uncontrolled environment, will deteriorate to… Read more »
The Berry Boys – Photos featuring New Zealand World War One Soldiers
Te Papa has a wonderful collection of 172 portraits on glass plate negatives featuring World War One soldiers. These images were taken at the Berry & Co. photography studio in Wellington between about 1914 and 1919. The men in these images were about to enter into a life-changing event. Some would survive, a large number would… Read more »
Precious and rare eggs – bird photography
Hollowed out and painted birds eggs were the first Easter eggs and, in Christian tradition, they symbolise new life. Te Papa’s photography collection holds a large number of prints and negatives taken by naturalists and bird watchers with an enviable amount of enthusiasm and perseverance. These images show a variety of different eggs – and… Read more »
Stories from the First World War: The Costello Family
During my time as intern at Te Papa, I have been working to try to discover the identities of the sitters who appear in a collection of photographic portraits held in the museum’s collection. The portraits depict soldiers who had their photographs taken at the studio of Berry & Co. in Wellington before they embarked… Read more »
More Stories from the First World War
During my internship with the Te Papa History Team, I have been working to try to identify the sitters who appear in a number of photographic portraits which are held in the museum’s collection. Using military personnel files, databases and online resources I have tried to discover more information about the soldiers who had their… Read more »
Stories of the First World War: John and Donald Jessen
As an intern with the History Department at Te Papa, I have been given the challenging task of researching the sitters who appear in a number of photographic portraits held in the collection. Looking closely at some of the pictures, it seems that the images contained on the museum’s glass plate negatives are not all… Read more »
Stories from the First World War: Sergeant-Major Vandersluys
As an intern with the History Department at Te Papa, I have been given the challenging task of researching the sitters who appear in a number of photographic portraits held in the collection. Read more about the Berry & Co. collection My task is to try to identify the soldiers who appear in these photographs,… Read more »
Wanted: loved ones
All we know about him is a name written on a glass negative: ‘Hart’. Ever since I first saw him I have kept his photograph on my wall. He has been the inspiration for many hours of image research for the World War I film that screens in Te Papa’s C20th history exhibition, Slice of Heaven. Using silent archive footage and stills the film… Read more »
Faraway Places – new work
This week Faraway Places: 19th century travel photography in Te Papa’s Ilott Gallery has had all its photographs replaced with 22 new ones. This is because nineteenth century photographs are vulnerable to damage by light, so the six-month exhibition has been divided into two halves, each with a different, though similar, selection of work. Often this simply entailed… Read more »