Talbot, William Henry Fox, 1800-1877
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Photographic inventor and polymath William Henry Fox Talbot (1800-1877) was descended on his mother's side from the earls of Ilchester, Somerset. His father, an infantry captain, died when he was a baby, leaving him Lacock Abbey estate in Wiltshire, along with enormous debts. The family rented out the estate in order to pay these off until Talbot was 27, when he took possession of the property and made it his home. Talbot married in 1832 and had four children.
Having no natural artistic talent with the camera obscura or camera lucida, he began to think about finding a way of fixing images on paper. He first began photographic experiments in 1834 and in January 1839, his paper ‘On the Art of Photogenic Drawing’ was presented to the Royal Society in London, shortly after Louis Daguerre had announced his photographic discoveries in France. In late 1840, Talbot found that he was able to have shortened exposure times to create a latent image that was made visible with further chemical processing. He called the process the ‘calotype’. The calotype produced a paper negative which could then be used to create a positive image, often a salted paper print. While Talbot did not find much success, he is credited as the inventor of the negative to positive photographic process that formed the basis of photography through the 19th and 20th centuries.
By the early 1850s Talbot had ceased experimenting with photography per se and turned his attention to processes for printing photographs using a plate and ink, two of which he patented. These laid the foundation for the later development of photogravure printing.
| Role | Title | Holding Repository | |
|---|---|---|---|
| referencedIn | Oral history interview with Beaumont Newhall | Archives of American Art |
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| Relation | Name |
|---|---|
| associatedWith | Abbotsford (House : Roxburgh District, Scotland) |
| associatedWith | Atkins, Anna, 1799-1871 |
| associatedWith | Boni, Albert, 1892-1981. |
| associatedWith | Bonnemaison, Joachim 1943- |
| associatedWith | Brewster, David, Sir, 1781-1868. |
| associatedWith | Bridges, George Wilson |
| associatedWith | Brooker, Thomas, 1813-1885. |
| associatedWith | Clouzard et Soulier. |
| associatedWith | Clouzard, Athanase, 1820-1903. |
| associatedWith | Coventry, Andrew. |
Person
Birth 1800-02-11
Death 1877-09-17
Male
Britons
English
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Talbot, William Henry Fox, 1800-1877
| Talbot, William Henry Fox, 1800-1877 | Title |
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