Queen's Gallery, Palace of
Holyroodhouse, Edinburgh until November 26th
The image of nineteenth century war photographer Roger Fenton dressed as an Algerian soldier at the start of this major showing of the Rochdale-born snapper's extensive frontline dispatches from the Crimean War says much about the sense of derring-do that pervades early on. With Britain, France, the Ottoman Empire and the Kingdom of Sardinia at war with the Russian Empire since 1853, Fenton was hired by Manchester publishers Thomas Agnew and Son to document the War in a way that could be used by painter Thomas Barker, who they also commissioned. More than fifty of Fenton's studies are rounded up in Barker's The Allied Generals with the Officers of their Respective Staffs Before Sebastopol, a piece worth it for the title alone, which resembles that of a Howard Barker play.
While technology didn't allow for action shots, it is the barren ravine captured in Fenton's own The Valley of the Shadow of Death, an apparent;y manipulated image loaded with used cannonballs, that is most striking, even if Fenton did “interfere with the truth” as McCullin puts it.
If the post war section is a well-meaning guddle, it's only because Fenton had presumably moved onto other projects, having made less on his Crimea pictures than expected. It is left to Joseph Cundall and Robert Howlett to document images of wounded soldiers, as well as more commentary from McCullin to point up the real collateral damage of such international follies.
The image of nineteenth century war photographer Roger Fenton dressed as an Algerian soldier at the start of this major showing of the Rochdale-born snapper's extensive frontline dispatches from the Crimean War says much about the sense of derring-do that pervades early on. With Britain, France, the Ottoman Empire and the Kingdom of Sardinia at war with the Russian Empire since 1853, Fenton was hired by Manchester publishers Thomas Agnew and Son to document the War in a way that could be used by painter Thomas Barker, who they also commissioned. More than fifty of Fenton's studies are rounded up in Barker's The Allied Generals with the Officers of their Respective Staffs Before Sebastopol, a piece worth it for the title alone, which resembles that of a Howard Barker play.
It was a commercial gig, with Fenton
encouraged by friends in high places to deliver a more heroic
counterpoint to the critical war reporting of Times journalist
William Russell. Things didn't work out like that, however, with
Russell having already inspired Alfred Lord Tennyson to use the
phrase 'the Valley of Death' in his poem, The Charge of the Light
Brigade. Tennyson's bust sits on the stairwell of the Queen's
Gallery, and his voice can be heard reading the first lines of his
poem on the recorded guide essential to the exhibition. Curator
Sophie Gordon, celebrated war photographer Don McCullin and even
Prince Harry all chip in as our guides.
Beyond
portraits of crusty looking generals posing stiffly on and off the
battlefield, the show becomes as much about Fenton's journey as the
work, which may yet inspire a Bank Holiday friendly big screen
blockbuster in his honour. Likewise the roll-call of bit-part players
captured here, including the shell-shocked Lord Balgonie, officer's
wife on horse-back Mrs Duberly, and a Colonel Brownrigg sitting with
two Russian boys apparently taken prisoner by the British.
While technology didn't allow for action shots, it is the barren ravine captured in Fenton's own The Valley of the Shadow of Death, an apparent;y manipulated image loaded with used cannonballs, that is most striking, even if Fenton did “interfere with the truth” as McCullin puts it.
If the post war section is a well-meaning guddle, it's only because Fenton had presumably moved onto other projects, having made less on his Crimea pictures than expected. It is left to Joseph Cundall and Robert Howlett to document images of wounded soldiers, as well as more commentary from McCullin to point up the real collateral damage of such international follies.
Scottish Art News, Autumn / Winter 2017
Ends
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