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Although he also photographed the works of old
masters, such as the Hans Holbein pictures in the
Royal Collections at Windsor Castle, most of Hollyer’s
output reproduced the work of his contemporaries. His
clients grew to include many artists associated with
the Pre-Raphaelite and Aesthetic Movement such as
Dante Gabriel Rossetti, Simeon Solomon, Sir William
Blake Richmond and Albert Moore. Hollyer became
particularly closely associated with George Frederick
Watts and Edward Burne-Jones and made many fi ne
reproductions in a collaboration with the artists last-
ing many years. Working closely with such artists,
Hollyer made photographs of works in progress—the
prints often suggesting modifi cations to the artists -
that are valuable today in revealing the different states
of the pictures and the draftsmen’s working methods.
He established himself as the leading specialist in the
photographic reproduction of artworks in England that
sold widely in Europe, and did played a major role in
popularising the artists’ works. Hollyer’s reproductions
were regarded as more than a type of facsimile. In Mrs.
Russell Barrington’s The Life, Letters and Work of Lord
Leighton (London 1908, vol. II, 288), the artist George
Frederick Watts noted, “Mr. Hollyer’s photographs are
not merely copies—they have as art an atmosphere of
charm in themselves; they render what may be called
the soul of a picture.” Hollyer himself proclaimed, “I
am quite convinced that something, call it art or what
you will, but something more than mere mechanical
and scientifi c excellence, not only can, but should,
fi nd its way into every print from every negative that
leaves the photographer’s studio” (The Studio, vol. 1,
1893, 194).
Hollyer made albumen prints from collodion nega-
tives, e.g. Eight Designs for the Song of Songs by Simeon
Solomon (V&A) and prints on unglazed salted paper un-
til around 1878. However, his subsequent use of gelatin
dry plates coupled with platinotype printing (introduced
in 1873) signifi cantly improved the quality of his repro-
ductions. With their matt fi nish, platinum prints rendered
the surfaces of pencil or charcoal drawings with great
veracity and tonal subtlety. Many of Hollyer’s platinum
print photographs of drawings are diffi cult to distinguish
from the original, especially when presented in mounts
and decorative frames of the period. He became well
known for his fastidious workmanship and corresponded
with Frederick Evans, another of the chief exponents of
the medium, on platinum printing techniques.
Hollyer gained a high reputation among artistic and
literary circles through his work that gave him a privi-
leged level of access to a wide range of notable society
fi gures. He took this opportunity to make a great many
revealing and intimate portraits. His gift for portrai-
ture, which he is modestly said to have practiced “for
relaxation,” was carried out, for some thirty years, on
the Mondays reserved for sitters who visited his studio.
Three albums of platinum prints in the V&A collection
contain just under two hundred portrait photographs and
show the panoply of contemporary celebrities who sat
for his camera. The albums are titled Portraits of Many
Persons of Note Photographed by Frederick Hollyer
and are inscribed to Hollyer’s daughter, Eleanor, dated- The portraits are meticulously titled, dates and
indexed, many accompanied by the sitter’s autographs
cut from correspondence. They show many artists,
including William Morris, Burne-Jones, Ford Madox
Brown, William Holman Hunt, Simeon Solomon, G.F.
Watts, Albert Moore, Lawrence Alma Tadema, John
William Waterhouse, Aubrey Beardsley, Walter Crane
and Camille Pissarro, as well as writers such as John
Ruskin, Walter Pater, W.B. Yeats, H.G. Wells and George
Bernard Shaw and celebrities such as the actress Ellen
Terry. Hollyer’s self-portrait occupies the fi nal page
of the last volume. Collectively, these works form an
astonishing profi le of late-nineteenth century cultural
life in England.
Today Hollyer is best known for his reproduc-
tions and portraits, although there is evidence of his
involvement in fi ne art photography - rather than the
photography of fi ne art. In 1893, The Studio published
an interview with Hollyer that reproduced fi ve of his
original landscape photographs, among them a view
of the Thames and Waterloo Bridge. The captions note
that the photographs are ‘untouched’ and a large part of
the interview is concerned with advocating the purity
of making photographs that had not been subjected to
what Hollyer described as the ‘fatal crime of touching
and retouching negative or print’.
In 1893 Hollyer became a member of the Linked Ring
and in 1895 Fellow of the Royal Photographic Society.
In 1902 an exhibition of Hollyer’s photographs was held
at Egyptian Hall, London. A number of the photographs
were presented in frames designed by Hollyer and by
G.F. Watts. The catalogue of the exhibition also lists
photographs of works by Botticelli, and other artworks
made from collections in Florence and The Hague, by
Hollyer’s eldest son, Frederick T. Hollyer. Frederick
Hollyer retired from active work in 1913 but his two
sons Frederick T. and Arthur S. Hollyer carried on the
business of fi ne art reproductions. The Hollyers’ large
stock of images was advertised in the Catalogue of
Reproductions of Pictures & Sculpture...(1924). This
included much of Hollyer’s previous stock as well as
reproductions from artworks at The National Gallery
and Tate Gallery London, Museums in Dublin and
Edinburgh, the Uffi zzi and the Louvre. It offered prints
ranging from 13 × 10 inches (33 × 25.4cm) to 36 × 24
inches (91.4 × 61cm) available on platinum or bromide
paper in grey or sepia tone and with some reproductions
produced in colour. For the last two years of his life