EARLIEST PHOTOGRAPHS INDIA: CASED AMBROTYPE OF A BRITISH GENTLEMAN

Circa 1850s

Ambrotype on glass

Hand-tinted, gilt highlights, oval-top ornate gilt mount, interior with maroon velvet pad, a folding leather case with photographer's gilt credit stamp Baker's Photographic Gallery, Calcutta on the front cover, decorative gilt clasp.

Half-plate: 5 x 4 in (12.5 x 10 cm)
Overall (case, closed): 5.5 x 4.5 in (13.9 x 11.4 cm)

ONE OF THE EARLIEST STUDIOS IN INDIA, BAKER WAS A PROLIFIC PHOTOGRAPHER, WHOSE WORKS ARE EXTREMELY RARE AND SCARCE AND COMMAND PHENOMENAL PRICES THESE DAYS

A prolific commercial photographer in Northern India from the mid-1850s until the end of the 1860s. Baker appears to have arrived in Calcutta in around 1855, as an employee of the millinery firm of Appleton and Co. He was also, however concurrently managing the daguerreotype studios of James William Newland and in August 1857, on his return from a photographic tour of the North West Provinces, he established his own business in Calcutta under the title of Baker's Daguerrean Rooms. The studio flourished throughout the 1860s, in due course changing its name to the Calcutta Photographic Company. While Baker produced the standard commercial fare of portraits and topographical views for the European market, the studio's most historically significant work remains its extensive documentation of the devastating cyclone which struck Calcutta in 1864. Baker appears to have abandoned photography to the firm of Sache and Westfield, returning to his early trade of milliner in the partnership of Baker and Catliff. Between 1887 and 1896 he was resident in Rangoon and although his date of death or departure from India has not been established, he appears to have still been living in Calcutta as late as 1908. [John Hannavy ed., Encyclopedia of Nineteenth-Century Photography, New York: Routledge, 2008, p.107]

The ambrotype is a direct positive monochrome photographic process. It is a wet collodion glass plate negative which when viewed against a dark background looks like a positive photograph. The choice of the term "ambrotype", from the Greek "ambrotos" meaning "imperishable" or "immortal", is probably linked to the durability of the glass base.

Although the first portraits made using this process were presented by Frederick Scott Archer in 1851, then by Adolphe Martin in 1852 under the name of "amphitype", the process was only patented under this name in 1854 by James Anson [Ambrose] Cutting. The patent states that a collodion direct positive is made on a glass plate hermetically sealed using Canadian balsam resin, a resin from Canadian fir trees.

Less expensive to produce than daguerreotypes and requiring shorter exposure times, ambrotypes were regularly used from 1854 up to the 1870s. It especially found favour in the United States, particularly with portrait photographers.

To produce the negative part of this unique object, one side of a clean glass plate is covered with a thin layer of collodion containing ammonium or potassium halides (iodide or iodide and bromide). This collodion emulsion is richer in ether than the one used for producing conventional collodion negatives so as to produce a whitish image, making it show up better against the dark background used for viewing it. Dipping in a silver nitrate solution ensures that it will be uniformly sensitive to light prior to exposing the plate when still wet. After development in a nitric acid and iron sulphate developer, sometimes with added silver nitrate, the image is fixed in a bath of sodium thiosulphate or potassium cyanide. Using iron sulphate gives the ambrotype its characteristic creamy tint. After drying, a transparent varnish is applied, and sometimes, additional colour highlights.

The dark background against which the negative is placed may be of various kinds: paper, velvet or a varnish made from a base of bitumen of Judea and turpentine.

When the background is placed against the glass and not against the emulsion, an impression of depth is formed by the space between the light and dark areas.

Then the complete assembly is placed in a frame or case, just like the daguerreotypes that ambrotypes are often confused with. This is because the aesthetic aspects of the two processes are similar, although ambrotypes show less detail.

Ambrotypes, comprising a glass base, are fragile objects and may crack, break or even become opaque over time. The collodion emulsion, protective varnish and the dark varnish may also suffer from various alterations due to their nature and how they are preserved. Most common is flaking of the dark varnish, lifting or reticulation of the collodion layer and silver tarnishing. Once the dark background alters, the picture losses its legibility and seem to disappear. Less fragile varieties using different kinds of supports as a thin iron sheet (tintype) or a wax-canvas (pannotype) were developed.

Text credit @ Visual glossary of photographic techniques / ARCP / Mairie de Paris, 2013

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