Anna Atkins was born with a love of science from her father. John George Children was appointed co-head of the natural history collection at the British Museum in 1822. He was particularly interested in mineralogy and chemistry. As Anna Atkins grew up, however, the Briton devoted herself to botany. In the first half of the 19th century, botany was one of the few disciplines open to women as a field of scientific activity in a male-dominated environment.
In 1839 Atkins was admitted to the newly founded Botanical Society of London, where her father was Vice President. At that time, numerous researchers were working in parallel on attempts to fix the impressions of light on light-sensitive material. One of the methods discovered was the calotype. This is a negative process, i. H. in photography, a negative is created first. Because the calotype offered the possibility for the first time to produce any number of prints, this was a key technique. Its inventor is called William Henry Fox Talbot. His friend John Herschel. He further developed this technique and invented the cyanotype.
The technique of cyanotype
The process is so easy that it has become a pastime for the Herschel family. Only two chemicals are required, which are applied to a piece of paper with a brush or sponge in a dark environment. If you place an object on the prepared sheet and expose both to sunlight, the object’s outlines appear latently on the sheet.
This creates the Prussian blue pigment that forms the distinctive background of these artworks. The longer the paper is exposed to the sun, the deeper the shade of blue in the exposed areas, while the covered areas remain white. This creates a negative image of the object.
Three works within ten years
Herschel was in and out of Atkins and her father’s house. No wonder, then, that the botanist found out about the new technology. In October 1843 she embarked on an ambitious project: to take photographs of all British algae and ferns.
The cyanotype photograms of algae and ferns that Atkins produced in the years that followed were the first books of photographs. In October 1843 the first part of the album British Algae, which she dedicated to her father, was completed in an edition of about 15 copies. Atkins exposed more than 450 cyanotypes of various algae for this first work. The sheer volume of this production makes her the most important user of cyanotype ever.
Another part of the British Algae was already completed in February of the following year. In November 1853 Atkins completed the third and final volume of the album.
“Anna Atkins. Cyanotypes” shows Atkins works in full for the first time
Atkins’ album British Algae (1843-1853) and her friend Anne Dixon’s book Cyanotypes of British and Foreign Ferns (1853) are works of exceptional rarity. The new photo book “Anna Atkins. Cyanotypes” shows these works in full for the first time and presents Atkins’ pioneering technique of photographically documenting botanical species. The over 550 cyanotypes In his introductory essays, Peter Walther places it in a scientific and art historical context in order to appreciate the groundbreaking contributions of a true pioneer.