Talbot and Botany

Abstract

In an effort to make his invention of negative-positive paper photography known on the continent, William Henry Fox Talbot sent photogenic drawings to several Italian scientists in 1839 and 1840. The first to see specimens of Talbot's new art was the distinguished Bolognese botanist Antonio Bertoloni (figure 1). Between June 1839 and June 1840 Bertoloni received thirty-six photogenic drawings, distributed over five instalments, of which fifteen depicted leaves and plants; several others were intended to illustrate the potential utility of photography to botanists. The photographs, three letters from Talbot, a letter to Bertoloni from Talbot's uncle, William Thomas Homer Fox Strangways, and related printed and photographic materials are collected in a remarkable small volume, entitled Album di disegni fotogenici, preserved in the Department of Photographs at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York.1

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