Special One-Day Showing: Early Berkeley “Tinted Photos” and Their History
By the early 20th century, photographs were coming into their own as an art form. Many Berkeleyeans proudly displayed on their walls not only traditional paintings and etchings, but artistic photographs taken by both commercial and amateur photographers, often elaborately framed under glass. Favorite subjects of this art included local scenes and California monuments from Yosemite, to San Francisco’s Golden Gate, the Monterey Coast, California’s missions, and Berkeley’s proud new Campanile. The photographs came in several different forms, including black and white, sepia, “gold tone,” and “tinted” photos that had been carefully colorized by hand. Several Berkeley shops produced and sold this art, ranging in size from palm-sized images to grand panoramas three or more feet long.
Steven Finacom will share for the afternoon about twenty local art photographs from a century or more ago, including several depicting classic Berkeley scenes—UC campus buildings, picturesque residences and neighborhoods, oak and eucalyptus woodlands, and Berkeley’s magnificent views. He’ll briefly describe not only the local art and some of the artists who created it, but how this art form fit into a national context.
Note: The History Center will be closed Thursday and Friday, November 23 and 24.