ary photographs, drawn from the Collection, forms
special exhibitions and illustrates a history of photo-
graphy in the Photography Gallery. The Photography
Collection is one of the largest and most important in
the world. It is international and ranges from the
beginnings of photography in 1839 to the present.
The V&A’s collection began in 1856, in the museum’s
library, later the National Art Library. The first
acquisitions of photographic art were made by Sir
Henry Cole, the founding director, from the annual
exhibition of the Photographic Society of London.
Two years later, an international exhibition of photo-
graphy was held—the first at any museum.
In the 1850s, acquisitions were made direct from
major creative photographers, and the collection
grew into one of the richest in the world. By 1859
the Library had acquired over 8,000 prints includ-
ing work by Roger Fenton and Edouard Baldus.
The V&A was the first to buy and exhibit the then-
radical photographs of Julia Margaret Cameron in
1865, and in 1868 received by bequest one of the
finest early private collections of photography, the
Townshend collection, which includes an outstand-
ing collection of photographs by Gustave Le Gray.
To solidify the nineteenth century collection, the
V&A retrospectively began collecting classic early
photography in the 1930s. In-depth collecting of
contemporary photographic art was undertaken in
the 1960s.
The collection was transferred from the Library
to the Department of Prints and Drawings in 1977
to become the nucleus of the ‘‘national collection of
the art of photography in the United Kingdom.’’
Since that date it has rapidly expanded to represent
classic photography of the nineteenth century and
the twentieth century, and to take a leading role in
the collection of contemporary photography, hold-
ing, at the end of the twentieth century, over 300,000
prints. Genre concentrations include photojourn-
alism and fashion photography. Photographers
represented in-depth include Henri Cartier-Bres-
son, Bill Brandt, Isle Bing, Guy Bourdin, and
many others. An index to the photographers repre-
sented is in the Print Room.
A major reference collection of publications on
photography is available in the National Art Lib-
rary, including William Henry Fox Talbot’sThe
Pencil of Nature(1844–1846) and Peter Henry Em-
erson’sLife and Landscape on the Norfolk Broads
(1886). Since 1977 the Library has acquired substan-
tially in the field of photography publications,
including key journals, monographs, early texts,
exhibition catalogues, and experimental publica-
tions. These are supplemented by ‘Information
Files’ on photographers and institutions, containing
such materials as press cuttings, exhibition an-
nouncements, and sometimes correspondence. The
Victoria and Albert’s Theatre Museum, and the
Indian and South East Asian department also hold
photographic archives. The Photography Collec-
tion is distinct from the Victoria and Albert Picture
Library where reproductions of works of art in the
museum are available. Most photographs in the
Photography Collection within the Department of
Prints, Drawings, Paintings, and Photographs that
are not currently on display are available to visitors
through the Print Room.
From the very beginning the V&A has recognized
the importance of the museum as a research institu-
tion, and through their activities, the knowledge in the
field of the history of photography is enriched. The
photography collections of the V&A recognize that
one of the most fascinating aspects of photography is
its multi-faceted nature, which renders difficult an
attempt to fit it into an organized system of human
knowledge. If the founders of the Universal Decimal
Classification are to be followed, photography is re-
lated to music, art, arts and crafts, and sports, since all
of these particular domains belong to ‘‘Class Seven.’’
This classification dilemma would be less disturbing if
a definitive answer could be given to the question
‘‘what is photography?’’ Photography can exist as an
immaterial idea or in a material form. As an idea,
photography expresses itself as information, as com-
munication, as art, or as a scientific thought collective
with an academic tradition of its own.
As a material expression, photography is a record
of the physical world, a technique, or a system
composed of a light sensitive element, a registering
device, and a processing cycle. A study of the photo-
graphs held by the Victoria and Albert reminds us
that photography is also an industry. The recent
successor of the long-time curator Mark Haworth-
Booth,Martin Barnes as new Head of Photography
and Curator, Word & Image Department provides
the best proof of this statement.
JohanSwinnen
Seealso:Museums: EuropeFurther Reading
Haworth-Booth, Mark.Photography: An Independent Art.
Photographs from the Victoria and Albert Museum 1839–
1996.
Victoria and Albert Museum. http://www.vam.ac.uk/collec
tions/photography/ (accessed June 1, 2005).VICTORIA AND ALBERT MUSEUM