The history of photography in Russia. The first photos and cameras

The desire to capture the moments of life that occur with a person or the world around him, has always existed. Rock carvings and fine arts speak of this. In the canvases of artists, precision and detail were particularly appreciated, the ability to capture an object in a profitable perspective, light, convey a color palette, shadows. At times such work took months of work. It is this desire, as well as the desire to reduce the time costs and became the impetus for creating this kind of art, like photography.

Appearance of the photo

In the IV century BC, Aristotle, a famous scientist from ancient Greece, noticed a curious fact: the light that seeped through a small hole in the shutter of the window, repeated the shadows on the wall overlooking the window landscape.

Further in the treatises of scientists from the Arab countries begins to mention the phrase camera obscura, literally meaning "dark room". This turned out to be a device in the form of a box with a hole in front, with the help of which it became possible to paint still lifes and landscapes. Later the box was refined, providing the moving halves and lens, which made it possible to focus on the picture.

Thanks to new features, the pictures became much brighter, and the device was called the "bright room", that is, the camera lucina. Such simple technologies allowed us to find out what Arkhangelsk looked like in the middle of the 17th century. With their help, the perspective of the city, distinguished by its accuracy, was removed.

Stages of the development of photography

In the XIX century, Joseph Niepce invented a method of photographing, which he called a heliogravure. Shooting by this method took place in bright sun and lasted up to 8 hours. The essence of it was as follows:

• A metal plate was taken, which was covered with bituminous varnish.

• The plate was directly exposed to bright light, due to which the varnish did not dissolve. But this process was heterogeneous and depended on the strength of the lighting in each of the plots.

• The plate was then treated with a solvent.

• After being acid etched.

As a result of all manipulations, a relief, etched pattern appeared on the plate. The next significant stage in the development of photography was the daguerreotype. The name received its name on behalf of its inventor, Louis Jacques Manda Daguerre, who was able to obtain an image on a silver plate treated with iodine pairs.

The next method was the calotypy invented by Henry Talbot. The advantage of the method was the ability to make copies of one image, which, in turn, was reproduced on paper impregnated with salt of silver.

The first acquaintance with the art of photography in Russia

The history of Russian photography has been going on for more than a century and a half. And this story is full of different events and interesting facts. Thanks to people who have opened art of photography for our country, we can see Russia through the prism of time as it was many years ago.

The history of photography in Russia begins in 1839. It was then that a member of the Russian Academy of Sciences I.Gamel went to the UK, where he got acquainted with the method of calotypy, studying it in detail. Then he sent a detailed description. So the first photos were taken, made by the method of calotypy, which are still stored in the Academy of Sciences in the amount of 12 pieces. The pictures contain the signature of the inventor of the method, Talbot.

After that, in France there is an acquaintance of Gamel with Daguerre, under the guidance of which he personally takes several photographs. The Academy of Sciences in September 1841 received a letter from Gamel, in which, according to his words, was the first photo taken from nature. On a photograph taken in Paris - a female figure.

After that, photo art in Russia began to gain momentum, rapidly developing. Between the XIX and XX centuries, photographers from Russia began to take part in photo exhibitions and salons of the international class on which they received prestigious awards and prizes, and had membership in the respective communities.

Talbot Method

The history of photography in Russia was developed thanks to people who were keenly interested in the new art form. So was Julius Fyodorovich Fritzsche, a famous Russian botanist and chemist. He was the first to learn the Talbot method, which consisted in obtaining a negative on photosensitive paper with its subsequent printing on a sheet processed with silver salts and manifested in sunlight.

Fritzsche made the first photographs-kalotipy leaves of plants, then joined the Academy of Sciences in St. Petersburg in May 1839 with a report. In it, he said that he finds the method of calotypy suitable for imprinting flat objects. For example, the method is suitable for taking pictures of original plants with the accuracy required for botany.

The contribution of Yu. Fritsche

Thanks to Fritzsche, the history of photography in Russia took a step further: he suggested replacing sodium hyposulfate, which he used to display the Talbot image, with ammonia, which significantly improved the calotypy, improving image quality. Yuliy Fyodorovich was also the first in the country and one of the first in the world to conduct research on photography and photography.

Alexey Grekov and the "Artistic Cabin"

The history of photography in Russia continued, and Alexey Grekov made his next contribution to its development. Moscow inventor and engraver, he was the first Russian master of photography to master both calotypy and daguerreotype. And if you ask the question about what were the first cameras in Russia, then it is Grekov's invention, the "art room", that can be considered as such.

The first camera, created by him in 1840, allowed to make high-quality, with good sharpness, portrait photographs, which many photographers failed to achieve. Grekov came up with an armchair with special comfortable pads that supported the head of the person being photographed, allowing him not to get tired during a long sitting and to remain stationary. And to be motionless to the person in an armchair it was necessary long: 23 minutes on the bright sun, and in cloudy day - all 45.

Masters of photography Grekov is considered to be the first photo artist in Russia to be a portraitist. To achieve beautiful portrait photographs he was helped by the photographic device invented by him, consisting of a wooden chamber, in which light did not penetrate. But at the same time the boxes could be pulled out one from the other and returned to their seats. At the outer box on the front of it, he attached a lens, which was a lens. In the inner box was a plate, sensitive to light. Changing the distance between the boxes, that is, moving them one from the other or vice versa, you could achieve the necessary sharpness of the picture.

Contribution of Sergei Levitsky

The next person, thanks to which the history of photography in Russia was rapidly developing, was Sergei Levitsky. In the history of Russian photography daguerreptypes of Pyatigorsk and Kislovodsk appeared in the Caucasus. And also a gold medal of the art exhibition held in Paris, where he sent pictures to participate in the contest.

Sergei Levitsky was in the forefront of photographers who offered to change the decorative background for the filming. They also decided to perform retouching of portrait photos and their negatives in order to reduce or even remove technical defects, if any.

Levitsky left for Italy in 1845, deciding to raise the level of knowledge and skills in the field of daguerreotypy. He takes pictures of Rome, as well as portrait photos of Russian artists who lived there. And in 1847 he came up with a photographic device with folding fur, using for this fur from the accordion. Innovation allowed the camera to become more mobile, which largely affected the expansion of photography opportunities.

Sergey Levitsky returned to Russia as a professional photographer, having opened his own daguerreotype workshop in St. Petersburg "Svetopis". With her, he also opens a photo studio with a rich collection of portraits of Russian artists, writers and public figures. He does not abandon the study of the art of photography, continuing to study empirically the application of electric light and its combination with solar and their influence on images.

Russian Footprint in Photo Art

Artists, photography masters, inventors and scientists from Russia made a great contribution to the history and development of photography. So, among the creators of new types of cameras known Russian names such as Sreznevsky, Ezuchevsky, Karpov, Kurdyumov.

Even Dmitri Ivanovich Mendeleyev took an active part in theoretical and practical problems of making photographs. Together with Sreznevsky, they stood at the origins of the creation of a photographic department in the Russian Technical Society.

Widespread successes of the bright master of Russian photography, which can be put on one level with Levitsky, Andrei Dyer. He was the creator of the first photo album with portraits of famous scientists, doctors, travelers, writers, artists. A photo artist A. Karelin became known throughout Europe and entered the history of photography as the founder of the genre of household photography.

The development of photography in Russia

Interest in photography at the end of the XIX century increased not only among specialists, but also among ordinary people. And in 1887 the Photographic Herald was published, a magazine in which information was collected on prescriptions, chemical compositions, photo processing methods, theoretical data.

But before the revolution in Russia the opportunity to engage in artistic photography was available only to a small number of people, since practically none of the inventors of the camera had the opportunity to produce them on an industrial scale.

In 1919, VI Lenin issued a decree on the transition of the photographic industry under the control of the People's Commissariat of Education, and in 1929 the creation of photosensitive photographic materials, which later became available to all. And already in 1931 the first domestic camera "Photocor" appears.

The role of Russian masters, photographers, inventors in the development of photo art is great and takes a worthy place in the world history of photography.