Thanks to today’s instant access to cameras and computers, almost everything can be immediately photographed and then posted for the world to see.
But it wasn’t so long ago that photography was a tough and time-consuming process – and it’s that process that is spotlighted in the Ohio Historical Society’s latest exhibition, Faces of Appalachia: Photographs by Albert J. Ewing.
Ewing was an Ohio-born photographer whose career spanned the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Faces of Appalachia features a series of photos he took while traveling along the Ohio River, recording images of southeastern Ohio and West Virginia.
In addition to his photos, the exhibition includes a timeline of Ewing’s life, beginning with baby pictures, as well as a map charting his course of travel.
Another highlight is a photography studio straight out of the 1890s. A period camera and a variety of late 19th Century photography equipment are on hand, and although the equipment is not designed to be used by visitors, they are more than welcome to use their own cameras to snap a few photos. Period clothing – hats, jackets, skirts and more – is available in the room to enhance the authenticity of any old-timey photos visitors may take.
“People can just slip into (costumes) and have fun and take pictures,” says Lisa Wood, exhibition curator.
Also on display is a showcase of Ewing’s glass plate negatives, offering an experience totally different from looking at the photographs those negatives produced. While glass plate negatives aren’t extraordinarily rare, they have been out of use for about 90 years and it is unusual to find a sizable number of them in one place. The negatives are “stable but delicate,” Wood says, and many of them are just kept in storage out of the view of the public.
This particular collection was donated to the Ohio Historical Society in 1982 by a photography collector in Illinois who had purchased them from an antique store in Ohio.
Glass plate negatives were the first medium used to produce photographs and made for a very involved and complicated process. Ewing’s work was of particular appeal for the historical society because the images captured more than the typical staged portraits of the day, Wood says.
“The pictures are very relatable because it’s daily life,” she says. “There are lots of pictures of dogs and babies.”
The exhibition is on display through Dec. 29.
Holly Butcher is a contributing writer. Feedback welcome at gbishop@cityscenemediagroup.com.
