[GOLD RUSH] Ambrotype of Samuel and Elizabeth Bates, emigrants to Australia, 1855

A$1,350 · Offered by Douglas Stewart Fine Books

[United Kingdom or France] : [s.n.], 1855. Quarter plate ambrotype photograph with hand colouring, 130 x 105 mm, with original passe-partout frame comprising the cover glass (180 x 140 mm) and papered chip-board preserver with oval cut-out and gold painted border; the ambrotype with the original blackened backing paper intact, affixed to the back of the ambrotype s top edge with the original spots of glue (this uppermost part of the ambrotype is not exposed in the oval frame), original cloth covered thick card backing, with contemporary manuscript label inscribed Samuel Bates and Lizzy his Wife, 1st January 1855. Left for Austrilla (sic) soon after ; although all of the ambrotype s original components are present, the frame s cloth border has perished, meaning that the components are now separated (this actually provides a good opportunity to observe how this type of uncased ambrotype was assembled); the cover glass has a short diagonal scratch at the right hand edge, not impinging on the main image; the ambrotype itself is in very good condition, a beautifully composed portrait with rich tonal range and delicate colouring. The ambrotype, a cheaper alternative to the daguerreotype, became popular in the United Kingdom, Europe and North America from around 1853. A glass plate covered with a thin layer of collodion, then dipped in a silver nitrate solution, was exposed to the subject while still wet, then developed and fixed. When the reverse of this negative image was coated w

• Binding: Hardcover

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