Beschreibung:

Books: an album of photographs by Richard Keene of Derby 40 x 32 cm bound maroon leather with gold blocked title DERBYSHIRE PHOTOGRAPHS/by/RICHARD ... KEENE, gilt page ends, scuffed at edges, 50 pages each mounted with two half plate albumen prints of local scenes (100), mostly captioned in ink in the studio all in later bespoke box. Rare prints include Osmaston Hall, Derby, tapestry room and The Avenue, Chee Tor railway tunnel when built, Doveridge Milll, Osmaston Manor, Osmaston-by-Ashbourne as built, Riddings home farm, and two form Keene's 1859 tour of the Peak: Cucklet church and the photographer himself seated on the base of the Saxon Cross both at Eyam. Album datable to c. 1868/70 ***Richard Keene (1825-1894) was one of the more imporrtant pioneer provincial photographers. He began at a printer and art dealer, and took up ophotography very early under the encouragement of Rev. Edward Abney a friend of Fox-Talbot's and took his first datable views in 1853/54. He was initially helped by his friend John Alfred Warwick, the Midland Railway Telegraph Superintendent and later by a succession of asistants and often appeared in his own photographs, a distinctive, bearded figure in a broad-brimmed hat. By 1862, after undertaking three tours of Derbyshire and surrounding areas he diversified into professional photography, adding a glass gallery on the roof of his premises in Iron Gate, Derby. He was a founder member of the Derby Photographic Society and the national (later) Royal Photographic Society and specialised in topographical work, compiling albums for visitors and undertaking numerous private commissions. Read more