Friday marks 35 years of work to raise awareness about HIV and AIDS, as the City of St. Louis Department of Health and the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services recognize World AIDS Day. First observed in 1988, World AIDS Day is a day to join forces in the work to understand the impact of HIV and remember those lost to AIDS-related illnesses.
This year’s theme is “Remember and Commit.” It encourages people to remember the disparities and inequities that continue to create barriers to HIV testing, prevention services, and HIV care. It then calls us to commit to continuing the work of centering equity as we work toward ending the HIV epidemic.
The Department of Health continues to center equity as it works to ensure HIV testing services are available at no cost and are accessible throughout the St. Louis region. Partnerships with local organizations help to strengthen the work and expand quality services to the most vulnerable populations. Today, community members can order their own HIV test kit at www.takemehome.com. Through self-testing programs, the Department of Health and its partners have distributed over 1,307 at-home test kits across the St. Louis region. Residents can also stop at the department’s Health Stop at 1520 Market or visit a local community partner to access free HIV testing.
In addition to testing programs, the department’s staff works tirelessly to ensure persons living with HIV have linkage to care, medical services, and other supportive services. The department also works together with community partners to reduce barriers to accessing those services and others to enhance the lives of people living with HIV.
In observance of this year’s World AIDS Day, the Department of Health invites you to participate in regional events and celebrations across the city.
Shoppers, browsers, curiosity-seekers and onlookers will find all the fa-la-la-la-la they need from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. on Saturday, Dec. 2, when the Central PA Guild of Craftsmen presents the 46th annual Winter Craft Market at the Nittany Valley Sports Centre in State College.
The local chapter of the Pennsylvania Guild of Craftsmen hopes the sizeable venue will attract more visitors than ever.
“It’s a large, well-lit area, with plenty of room to spread out,” according to event committee member Christine Stangel. Since this year’s event will include more than 50 artisans, both participants and organizers appreciate the spacious venue.
Stangel goes on to explain that the guild had to cancel the Winter Craft Market for 2020 and 2021 due to the COVID pandemic.
“That time period hurt artists in general,” adds Tess Clapper, who also serves on the committee, “and some had to leave the art community.”
But the enthusiasm artists have for this market hasn’t waned, and organizers take pride in the diversity and quality of work shown. Each applicant must present work to a jury, which then selects artists to participate in the market. The use of a jury maintains a high standard of well-made, unique items.
“We also have to limit each media,” Clapper continues, “so you won’t see too many silversmiths or too many fabric artists.” Instead, participants will present varied types of art.
Diane Maurer, internationally renowned paper artist, says she feels “great about participating, knowing that this show is well-juried.” Continuing, the Spring Mills artist says, “You’ll find good, high-quality work here. Good artwork and fine craft.”
Maurer excels in marbling, collage and surface design, a type of print or design used on a surface such as a wall or book cover. In 2018, the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City purchased 40 of her papers.
“They’re now preserved and protected in archival sleeves,” she says, “and I consider that the high point of my career so far.”
Her biography also includes an appearance on Martha Stewert Living and a design purchased by Godiva Chocolatiers for worldwide distribution. Additionally, she has authored numerous books detailing her work, her methods and her sources.
Maurer finds much of her inspiration in the outdoors. “I could see objects—streams or foliage—cut into images and made into a paper collage. Or I could trace an image in a 15th-century German work and use that in a paste paper.”
She says she appreciates the way artists at this show take the time to talk to visitors about their art.
“They feel so passionate about their work,” she observes, “and enjoy explaining their techniques and what inspires them.”
New York native Bonnie Hedden designs jewelry, incorporating gold, sterling silver and a variety of gemstones. The bracelets, earrings, necklaces and rings she develops draw the viewer’s eye with gleaming metal, flowing compositions and richly hued stones.
“Some artists will sketch things out,” she explains. “I let the stones speak to me—like putting together puzzle pieces.”
Some of her pieces feature imagery from nature. You’ll see leaves, vines, daisies and other flowers. Other items seemingly echo, twist, wind and coil, according to the shape of the opals, pearls, topaz and other gemstones Hedden uses. Armed with her snips, files, vices and torches, she approaches her work with a precise mastery.
“Details embellish the focal points,” she says, “and I just keep working until it’s done.”
An avid exhibitor attending 18 shows annually, Hedden won two prizes at the 2022 Lewiston Art Festival in New York state. She took home First Place for Artistic Craft as well as Best in Show.
“I really never expected it,” she recalls, “and I was just thrilled.”
Hedden has set up her cases and displays at the Winter Craft Market for 10 years. And she appreciates the guild’s dedication to staging an event so consistently brimming with high-caliber work.
“The Centre County Chapter of the PA Craft Guild does such a great job,” Hedden says, “and the organizers work hard. And I enjoy seeing such quality work from all the artisans.”
Master artisan Ted Walker fabricates and designs silver jewelry in southcentral Pennsylvania.
As his business name, Reflections in Silver, suggests, each silver pendant, ring, earring and necklace shimmers as light rebounds from it.
He describes his work as “flowing and calming.” Walker says the designs themselves simply come to him. “Sometimes I’ll see a shape in a dream or a daydream,” he says, “and I’ll start working with the silver and just see what happens.”
Spirals, coils, curls and waves, all in silver, make up many of Walker’s pieces. He frequently adds accent points like a lapis bead tucked into the crest of a wave, or a green onyx nestled against a long loop, or a moonstone perching on the round of an earring.
“I feel flattered when someone spends hard-earned money on something I’ve made,” Walker says, “and a part of you goes away with that buyer. It makes me happy and honored when a person feels strongly enough to buy from me.”
His interest in silversmithing evolved from his mother’s talent for jewelry-making and his “rock-hound” grandfather, who ran a small shop in Lancaster.
“From a sort of family tradition, I found myself designing and making jewelry,” he recalls.
Walker, like other artists, felt the sting of loss during the years COVID shut down the Winter Craft Market. “I’m glad we’re back again,” he says. “Events like this need continuity. It’s always good to see familiar faces when you’ve developed a stream of good customers. And this is a really nice venue.”
The Sports Centre offers a size that appeals to vendors and organizers alike. Stangel adds, “We have plenty of free parking. We do ask a $5 admission fee that helps cover promotional activities.”
The Boy Scouts of America will hand out wristbands to those attending. The bands will allow patrons to leave the Sports Centre, check out some of the other events in the county and return later.
The Clef Hangers, a vocal group from Mount Nittany Middle School, will serenade shoppers and enhance a festive atmosphere.
“This is a team effort from start to finish,” Clapper says, “and we like to say, ‘Shop local and buy handmade this season.’” T&G
IF YOU GO…
WHAT: Winter Craft Market
WHEN: 9 a.m.-6 p.m., Saturday, Dec. 2
WHERE: Nittany Valley Sports Centre, 177 Champion Drive, State College
ADMISSION: $5 cash only; free for children 12 and under
INFO: wintercraftmarket.org
Anne Dyer Walker is a Bellefonte freelance writer.
In 1830, when French-Monégasque inventor Hercule Florence was 26 years old, he wrote a long entry in his diary about the future he sensed approaching.
Soon, he predicted, people from nations that had never seen each other would meet, and do so frequently.
The inventions devised by Florence and many others in the 19th and 20th centuries—from Samuel Morse’s telegraph to Thomas Edison’s light bulb—have proven this prediction, connecting us despite distance and difference. But reaching the level of technological advancement we experience today required these ever-curious innovators to push through much struggle and failure.
As an inventor, Florence, like his peers, took on the early challenges of a field that would soon be known as photography. Unlike others, he limited his use of the camera obscura to his early experiments. The camera obscura is a device that projects an upside-down and reversed image of the external world onto a flat surface through a small hole. He was looking for a less expensive and involved method of printing than those available at the time. For a few decades, Europeans had been making images appear on chemically sensitized surfaces through exposure to light, but no one had yet figured out how to keep that image in place, preventing it from darkening over time.
Unlike contemporaries who worked on this and other issues, Florence traveled to South America, inspired by his reading of Daniel Defoe’s Robinson Crusoe. He found employment in Brazil, and it was there that he responded to an ad and was hired as an illustrator and draftsman for a scientific expedition. Though he was far from Europe, where news of progress and breakthroughs would have reached him more easily, he still managed to create images that have survived to this day.
Portrait of Hercule Florence
Photo: Courtesy Instituto Hercule Florence
Pharmacy labels created by Hercule Florence
Photo: Courtesy Insituto Hercule Florence
Florence and his generation birthed and rapidly developed photography as a medium, inventing numerous photographic methods. For Florence, a person of wide-ranging interests, photography would only be a brief pursuit, but he didn’t leave the field behind without first making his mark. He named his invention “Photographie,” a word he coined that derives from two Greek terms that together translate as “drawing with light.”
Early chemical photography used sunlight for exposure and varied development techniques, making this a complex and time-consuming endeavor. Nonetheless, it set the stage for the emergence of more convenient and accessible photographic processes that came into wide use during the 19th and 20th centuries—including those enabled by the Kodak Brownie, a portable, affordable camera that brought photography to the masses.
How photographs are made has changed drastically over the last 200 years—from capture on a chemically prepared surface to digital processes—and with this change, the number of images made each day has increased exponentially. According to 2023 Phototutorial data, five billion photographs are taken each day worldwide, and the average smartphone user keeps 2,100 pictures on their phone.
The comparatively small number of existing photographs from the 1800s makes them valuable, both as records of a way of life gone by and as examples of processes now only used by a handful of hobbyists, conservators, artists, and researchers.
Scientists at the Getty Conservation Institute (GCI), observing a shift in the availability of materials necessary for chemical photographic processes, began to gather samples of these supplies in the early 2000s. Since then the GCI has compiled a chemical photography reference collection, researched and published on the major historical chemical photographic processes and their variants, and studied examples of the processes in collections around the world.
These efforts serve the goal of better understanding what early chemical processes and techniques involved, so that examples of photographs from this era might be better cared for and appropriately displayed—thereby preserving them, and what they picture, for generations to come.
When Art Kaplan, who trained as a biochemist, joined the GCI to work on early photographic processes, he had some idea of what awaited him. “To me, photography was color and black and white,” he says.
He thought he could quickly grasp what he would need to know to do his job, but soon learned there was much more to it. “If we’re talking about processes and variations of the processes, there are a couple hundred. That’s a lot of chemistry.”
All that chemistry has kept him busy for nearly 20 years. Getty researchers working in this area aim to enhance the understanding of historical techniques, develop conservation strategies, and ensure the long-term preservation of valuable photographic collections.
Whenever Kaplan travels, he looks for local flea markets or pawnshops, having found interesting items to study in these places. While perusing, he keeps an eye out for any images that look unique or different from those he usually comes across, or that might represent a particular photographic process.
“I’ve purchased Wothlytypes,” Kaplan says, referring to pictures made using a silver-based photographic process that also utilizes uranium. This method was never widely taken up, and so examples of photos made using it are rare.
In 2022 Kaplan joined an international team of scholars, researchers, and scientists at the University of Évora in Portugal to study three of Florence’s surviving photographs. The research included analysis of the prints to determine their chemical makeup, the composition of their paper supports, and any chemistry indicating how the images may have been stabilized or fixed.
Findings to date, Kaplan says, show that the prints exemplify two different processes, one based on silver, the other on gold.
Because the GCI’s in-house science laboratories are currently under renovation, Kaplan hasn’t had the chance to duplicate Florence’s processes. He’ll take this next step once he has a functioning lab and access to the chemistry and a chemical hood, as well as to a dark space with sinks and water.
Though precise dating of Florence’s images is not possible with the tools currently available, researchers believe they are among the earliest in the world to have survived to the present day.
In collaboration with Carolyn Peter, assistant curator of photographs at the Getty Museum, Kaplan has recently studied early images by Hippolyte Bayard, a contemporary of Florence’s who developed the art over four decades.
Getty houses more than 200 of Bayard’s images—self-portraits, pictures of sculptures and buildings, photographs of other people—many of which came to the Museum pasted into a large album. To exhibit these prints, Peter needed to know if they could tolerate gallery conditions. She also wanted to verify the chemical recipes included in some of the images’ inscriptions. Kaplan and Getty Museum conservators Sarah Freeman and Ronel Namde ran tests to answer these questions.
Most of the Bayard photographs in Getty’s collection are salted paper prints, which were made by coating paper with light-sensitive silver salts. Some are direct positives— Bayard’s best-known process, one that produced unique images without a negative.
The information gathered by scanning several of Bayard’s photographs with specialized equipment has allowed Peter and her collaborators to tell a fuller story of Bayard’s work and to better understand his place in the development of photography in the 1830s and ’40s. Until the analysis was performed, for instance, it was not known whether the process Bayard had described in a sealed letter from 1839 corresponded to one or both of the images he had included with the letter.
The research also helps prove that in 1839 Bayard was already experimenting and coming up with processes that were different from those of two other major figures working at that time: Louis-Jacques-Mandé Daguerre and William Henry Fox Talbot.
Given the results of this research, showing which photographs can be displayed for the public and broadening the narrative concerning Bayard’s process, Peter is co-organizing an exhibition of Bayard’s work that will open at Getty on April 9, 2024.
Peter wants to continue testing Bayard’s recipes. It is known now that “there is some correspondence to the inscriptions”—those notes included alongside Bayard’s photographs in the album as it came to Getty—“and what’s actually in the photographs that we tested, and that’s really exciting,” Peter says. This proves her hunch that Bayard was, at the very least, involved in the album’s assembly.
This clarity about the album’s construction is one outcome of Kaplan’s research into Bayard’s photographs. His broader work with these early processes has helped to broaden the historical narrative about who invented the medium. The Getty Research Institute (GRI) has also been doing work in this area, but with an eye toward the future.
The GRI recently introduced a new generation to the importance of photography conservation by holding the first iteration of a workshop for undergraduate students from historically Black colleges and universities, during which attendees were able to work with the Johnson Publishing Company (JPC) archive. JPC, once the largest African American–owned publisher, founded Jet and Ebony magazines. Its archive of more than four million photographic prints, slides, and negatives, as well as other materials, is now owned by a consortium that includes Getty.
Kaplan participated in the workshop, sharing his own experiences in conservation over the last two decades. He will continue to teach at this and future seminars, take on research in partnership with others in the field, and search for more of those unique photographs as he travels.
There’s always the chance he’ll stumble across an example of a process not yet well known, one he’d be happy to share with the conservation world.
“Whenever I see something I don’t recognize or understand, I feel a rush of excitement and immediately start pondering what its analysis might show me,” Kaplan says.
Ask Dr. Richard Buswell how many photos he’s taken and printed over the span of his 51-year career and he can tell you exactly: 534.
“Which doesn’t sound like many,” he said in a recent interview.
Buswell just released “The Quest: A Montanan’s Photographic Journey,” which features 71 fantastic black and white photos taken over the course of decades, mostly at abandoned homes and townsites that are slowly fading into the Montana landscape.
Buswell, a native of Helena, made his living as a doctor of immunology and allergy for 37 years, but his passion for the past five decades has been roaming the Montana landscape, meticulously taking photos on film.
“I’m definitely old-fashioned,” he said. “I wouldn’t know what button to push on a digital camera.”
He started out in 1971 with two Nikkormat cameras. He uses four lenses, a 50 mm f1.4, a 105 mm, an 80-200 zoom and a 24 mm wide angle, as well as a tripod.
The cameras are completely manual and his bag weighs more than 40 pounds, he said. His favorite subjects are abandoned homes, mines and towns. His medical practice drew people from across the state and they would often give him tips on where to photograph. He also has a library of historical books on Montana ghost towns which also help him find his subjects.
“I spend two, three, four hours waiting for the light to be right,” he said.
He interviewed the renowned photographer Ansel Adams several times and took his advice to heart for his own work, Buswell said.
He develops his own film and makes his own prints in his home darkroom.
The prints featured in “The Quest” are often haunting, beautiful and abstract — rust patterns that look like eyes, weathered dolls from a different era, a stack of peas in their husks, a row of pike’s teeth.
One can get lost in a Buswell photo, they are profoundly simple and yet complex. His work has been collected by 234 museums, including the Smithsonian American Art Museum and Seattle Art Museum and his entire collection, printed on acid-free paper, resides at both the Montana Historical Society Library and the Beinecke Library at Yale University.
“The Quest” is his seventh book and one of his last, he said. At 78, he said he is all but done taking photographs — he can no longer carry the heavy pack or walk the miles to get to his subjects, he said.
He is currently working on an eighth book.
His advice for film photographers?
“It takes patience for one thing,” he said. But beyond that, there is the longevity of silver prints.
“A compelling reason (to shoot film) is the life expectancy of the prints,” he said.
“The Quest” is published jointly by the Montana Historical Society Press and the University of Montana Press. It is available at bookstores and online vendors such as Amazon.
Cloth doll (2020). (Richard Buswell photo)
Pike head (2019). (Richard Buswell photo)
Cabin Chinking (2016). (Richard Buswell photo)
An outstanding archive of letters written to clan chief The Mackintosh of Mackintosh, the majority personal autographed letters from the British Royal Family, are coming up for auction in the Books, Maps & Manuscripts Sale at Tennants Auctioneers on December 13 with an estimate of £1,000-£2,000.
Written in the first half of the 20th century, many of the letters discuss shooting at Moy Hall, the seat of the Chief of Clan Mackintosh, and were written by Prince George (later King George V), Prince Edward (later King Edward VIII), and Prince Albert (later King George VI).
In addition, there are letters from Queen Mary, the Duchess of Albany, and the last letter written by The Mackintosh’s son, Angus, before he died in North America in 1918. Alfred Donald Mackintosh of Mackintosh (1851-1938) was the 28th Chief of Clan Mackintosh and Chief of Clan Chatton. He and his wife divided their time between Moy Hall, near Inverness and Cottrell House in Glamorgan, his wife’s family home. A great friend of King George V, he devoted a great deal of his time to hunting, shooting, and fishing.
[embedded content]On a similar theme is an interesting manuscript diary giving a unique insight into the life of a young aristocrat and army officer in the late 19th century (estimate: £200-£400). Covering the period between March 25 and December 31, 1878, the diary is thought to have been penned by William George Frederick Cavendish Bentinck (1856-1948), father of the 8th and 9th Dukes of Portland and husband of the socialist suffragette Ruth Cavendish Bentinck.
The fascinating entries detail military training, dinners and London balls, theatre and racing trips, hunting, the House of Lords, grouse shooting, house parties at country estates including Sledmere and Nun Appleton, and a tour of France and Italy. In addition, the young Cavendish Bentinck went to view the scene of the terrible maritime disaster in which 600-700 people died when a pleasure steamer and a coal transport ship crashed on the Thames east of Woolwich. He recounts: “a steam launch…. Takes us down the river to where the collision between the Princess Alice and Bywell Castle took place we see innumerable boats dragging for dead bodies and about 7 recovered whilst we are on the spot on our return to Deptford we stop at Woolwich to view 75 bodies of the unclaimed drowned a ghastly and terrible sight”.
A further interesting diary in the sale is a First World War ‘Trench’ Diary written by an unknown Yorkshire soldier (estimate: £150-£250). The writer, thought to have been a signaller in a Royal Artillery company attached to the 49th West Riding Division, details life in France beginning with the journey to Le Havre on April 12, 1915, and going on to note details of laying signals, handling horses, visiting towns and villages, meals, injuries, shelling and the mud and rain. The diary ends abruptly on December 19, 1915 with an entry regarding a gas attack. This coincides with the first use of Phosgene gas against British Soldiers, in which the 49th (West Riding) Division was attacked north of Ypres.
Sony BBC invites entries for the third edition of the photography competition Earth In Focus. Rooted in the belief that every photograph tells a compelling story, this year’s theme Pride of India celebrates India’s architecture, cultures, and people. The contest empowers photographers to embody the role of storytellers. Earth In Focus invites photographers of all levels to participate and share their unique perspectives within the subcategories of Wildlife, Portraits, and Monuments.
The month-long competition allows people to cast their vote for their favourite photos from amongst those submitted. The contest will be judged by Supreet Sahoo, an avid birdwatcher and an award-winning photographer with a specialty in tropical bird photography. During his years in the tropical rainforests of Costa Rica, Ecuador, Colombia and several countries in Central and South America, Supreet has photographed over 3000 species of birds. He started his bird photo tour company Tropical Photo Tours in 2017.
The winners will get a chance to be featured on the Sony BBC Earth channel. Additionally, the top 15 winners will receive an opportunity to learn from Sandeep Sahoo.
For more information, visit //www.sonybbcearth.com/Earthinfocus/
More than 100 exhibitors from all over the world will be participating in the upcoming India Art Fair 2024. Among the exhibitors are 71 galleries, seven design studios, and major art institutions to make this 15th edition the biggest one so far. Known to be one of the leading platforms for showcasing modern and contemporary art under one roof, the artworks this year will be from India and South Asia. Organised in partnership with BMW India, the festival will be held in Mumbai from February 1-4 next year at the NSIC Exhibition Grounds.
The art festival will highlight the emerging contemporary design scene in South Asia in the Design section of the art fair. There will be limited edition and hand-made collectable furniture, jewellery, and fabric studios. There will also be 18 international galleries and institutions, as well as several global arts organisation leaders to participate in the Talks Programme.
“The landmark 15th edition of India Art Fair comes at an exciting time for both the South Asian art scene and the market, with artists from the region becoming a part of international conversations as never before. As we continue to grow as a fair, we remain focused on our mission to amplify the voices of the most exciting artists from the region and to support the expansion of South Asian creativity,” said Jaya Asokan, India Art Fair director in a statement.
She said some of India’s leading contemporary galleries along with established international art houses will be showcasing their rare masterpieces and modern art, as well as traditional art heritage from South Asia.
Some of the Indian art galleries which will be participating at the Indian Art Fair include Latitude 28, Gallery Espace, Shrine Empire, GALLERYSKE, Nature Morte, Vadehra Art Gallery, and Exhibit 320. Others include Chatterjee & Lal, Anant Art Gallery, Chemould Prescott Road, Jhaveri Contemporary, Galerie Isa, Gallery Maskara, Project 88, Gallery Art Exposure, Experimenter, Vida Heydari Contemporary, Emami Art, Dhi Contemporary, Gallery Veda, Apparao Galleries, Kalakriti Art Gallery, Iram Art, ZOCA,, Archer Art Gallery, and Shrishti Art Gallery among others.
There will also be modern galleries such as DAG, Crayon Art Gallery, Sanchit Art and Dhoomimal Gallery. The new Indian galleries, Gallerie Splash, and Method will also be exhibiting their work for the first time. Expect three new international galleries – Carpenters Workshop Gallery, Galerie Geek Art, and Indigo Madder to debut at the India Art Fair, in 2024. On the display will be mixed media works by veteran artists.
The Institution section of the India Art Fair will feature booths and projects by 22 leading cultural foundations, collectives and organisations. Some of them are the JSW Foundation, Purushottam Public Trust, Foundation of Indian Contemporary Art (FICA), Egaro Photo Festival, Unnati Cultural Village, the Basu Foundation, Galerie Lelong Paris, The French Institute in India, and Chanakya School of Craft.
The Artists-in-Residence segment will feature performance and mixed-media artists, graffiti and street artist Siddharth Gohil aka Khatra from coastal Gujarat, textile and installation artist Mayuri Chari from rural Maharashtra, and Merci Thamshangpha Maku from Manipur.
When: February 1-4
Where: NSIC Exhibition Grounds
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