Articles of Glass

1844

From the collection of Cleveland Museum of Art

Romanticism Early 19th Century Drinking Glass

Dominant colour

Articles of Glass is a 1844 by William Henry Fox Talbot, a Romanticism work, depicting Drinking Glass, held at Cleveland Museum of Art.

Who painted this?: William Henry Fox Talbot
When & what style?: 1844 · Romanticism
Where can I see it?: Cleveland Museum of Art

About this work

This photo-like image shows three rows of glassware on a plain dark backdrop. The glasses have sharp edges and bright highlights, making them pop against the black. Talbot used glassware to test his new calotype process. This early camera technique let him print the same image many times from one negative. Look for Talbot’s photo of a desk at the Cleveland Museum of Art.

The story of this work

Overview

Pursuing such diverse interests as language, mathematics, botany, and optics, William Henry Fox Talbot was a prominent scholar and scientist. In 1839 he invented the first system of positive and negative photography—the calotype process. The basis of all modern photography, the calotype's paper negative made possible the infinite reproduction of prints from a single negative. In Articles of Glass , three rows of sparkling glass objects are isolated against a dark background, illustrating the new medium's ability to capture the nuances of light and record reality. A remarkable technical and…

Read the full account in the museum source.