April 1873: “New Discoveries in Photography” – Works Published by the Autotype Fine-Art Company, at Thomas Annan, 202 Hope Street

An article on page four of the North British Daily Mail, on Saturday the 5th of April, 1873, reads:

 

“NEW DISCOVERIES IN PHOTOGRAPHY.—The two great objections to the use of photography in reproducing

high-class pictures—the want of permanency and peculiarities of colour—seem to have been completely overcome

in the works published by the Autotype Fine-Art Company. Mr Annan, Hope Street, their representative in Glasgow,

has now on view a number of remarkable fac-similes from the works of Turner, Claude, Sir Digby Wyatt, Sir Joshua

Reynolds, and other masters, which are perfectly marvellous in the fidelity with which they imitate the originals. The

peculiar tints of sepia, Indian ink, and chalk drawings are so exactly rendered that it is almost impossible to distinguish

them from the drawings themselves. A series taken from the frescoes of Michael Angelo on the roof of the Sistine Chapel

are executed with great delicacy and taste, and give at a comparatively small cost a better idea of these world-renowned

paintings than could be procured without the aid of photography at almost any price. The entire permanency of the colours

is a most important characteristic of these photographs. Another novelty at present in Mr Annan’s gallery is a series of

fac-similes in oil colours on canvas, prepared from photographs by a process in which the original touches of the artist’s

brush are reproduced. A photograph, from the original painting by Faed, ” A Wapinschaw in the 17th Century,” which has

never been published in any other form, has all the fidelity and softness of finish for which Mr Annan’s work is noted. He

has also prepared a finely-executed series connected with the old college in High Street, which contains views of the principal

buildings and portraits of the professors. These photographs are also permanent in colour, and we can hardly imagine a more

suitable memento of the Old University.”

 

 

There is an advertisement for the display, on the front page of the newspaper.

 

 

The British Newspaper Archive.

 

 

George Fairfull-Smith, February 2024.