Visitor's book from the Bruton Galleries; containing signatures of crew members and visitors to the "Discovery" Antarctic Exhibition.

by DISCOVERY EXPEDITION - SHACKLETON, Ernest H., and others.

$17,193 · Offered by Biblio

Signed

London: The Bruton Galleries, Bond Street,, 1904-36. The blockbuster Discovery exhibition of 1904 The original visitor's book for one of the stellar red-carpet events of the season: the Bruton Galleries exhibition of artefacts and artwork from Scott's Discovery expedition, a landmark in polar exploration. It includes the signatures of numerous crew members, including Ernest H. Shackleton, Edward A. Wilson, Charles Royds, Reginald Skelton, and Ernest E. Joyce, alongside Clements Markham and Llewellyn Longstaff, a financial angel of the expedition. The exhibition, which opened in November 1904, was curated by Clements Markham, who had organized the expedition and launched Scott's polar career. It was remarkably extensive, the catalogue listing 484 items, including 150 photographs by Reginald Skelton, 200 watercolours and drawings by Edward A. Wilson, equipment from the expedition, a model of the Discovery, rations, and the South Polar Times. The photographs and artwork constituted a visual record of Antarctic conditions and documented gruelling conditions, bringing home "the scale, magic, and danger of Antarctica … with a compelling immediacy" (Merwe & Michell, p. 66). The show proved extraordinarily popular, with "Bruton Street and New Bond Street lined with motorcars and carriages" (Huxley, p. 141). "Persons of rank and fashion were marshalled into a long queue by a policeman. Society folk were not used to queues in those days, and they protested that they had tickets; so, ha

• Year: 1904
• Binding: hardcover

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