Gloom and sparkle

As we are constantly reminded, every exhibition in these novelty-obsessed times has to be the first to do something, and the Tate’s rather dreary photo show is no exception. ‘The first major exhibition ever to present a photographic portrait of Britain from the invention of the medium to the present day,’ trumpets the press release. What a rich and varied panoply of images that suggests, and how tawdry and oddly defeated the reality proves to be. Forgive me if I single out only a few photos which seem to express some kind of hope or optimism: the leaden weight of material here is so depressing as to require substantial editing.  

The exhibition begins well, with Fox Talbot’s twig broom artily angled in an open doorway; an intriguing cyanotype by Anna Atkins; Tennyson and Carlyle by Julia Margaret Cameron. But is it more than another roll-call of the big names of photography? Roger Fenton is here of course, but so is the Barnardo’s archive. Lewis Carroll’s little girls could hardly be left out, but they are poignantly contrasted with Hugh Diamond’s psychiatric patients. I liked John Thomas’s studies of Welsh national costume and the photos of performers such as Dan Leno. But what really shone among all the reportage and records were the marvellous gelatin silver prints of vegetables by Charles Jones. Those and the amateur colour studies of gardens by Agnes Warburg, and the night scenes of Alvin Langdon Coburn.  

Arranged broadly chronologically, the procession of history continues with the Picture Post team, Bert Hardy down the Elephant, Humphrey Spender recording the Jarrow March, Percy Hennell’s stirring colour prints for J.B. Priestley’s book British Women Go to War, Bill Brandt and dear old Cecil Beaton.