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This work is licensed by Lisa Spiro under a Creative Commons License, and is an Open Educational Resource.
Last edited by Lisa Spiro on Oct 30, 2006 8:58 pm US/Central.
Summary: Describes how to view stereographs and how to use them in a research project. Lists print and online resources about stereographs. Part 4 of a 4 part course called "History through the Stereoscope."
Although many in the nineteenth century believed that photographs mirrored reality, images exist within specific cultural, aesthetic, and historical contexts. The photographer makes a number of choices, such as what subject to photograph, what point of view to adopt, and what to include and what to leave out. As Graham Clarke argues, “Whenever we look at a photographic image we engage in a series of complex readings which relate as much to the expectations and assumptions that we bring to the image as the photographic subject itself. Indeed, rather than the notion of looking, which suggests a passive act of recognition, we need to insist that we read a photograph, not as an image but as a text. That reading (any reading) involves a series of problematic, ambiguous, and often contradictory meanings and relationships between the reader and the image” (27). Reading photographs and stereographs thus requires an active process of asking questions about how the image is composed and what it signifies.
Whether you are studying the history of photography or depictions of Egyptian daily life by Europeans, stereographs can furnish an important source of evidence for research projects. Social historians can use stereographs to study everything from tourism to social attitudes toward women to representations of warfare and disasters. For example, one could ask how women are portrayed in the photos—are they participating in the activities or simply observers? Important to the history of photography, stereographs reflect changing manufacturing and distribution processes. We can also approach stereographs as aesthetic objects, studying their composition, use of shadow and light, perspective, shape, and so forth. What angle you plan to take for your research project will determine the questions that you ask. Below are some possible directions that a research project using stereographs from the TIMEA project could take. Although the stereographs themselves are an important starting point for research, you can enrich your project by also examining other sources, including primary sources such as letters, books, and newspaper articles and secondary sources such as scholarly books and articles.
(Thanks to David Getman and Pamela Francis for suggesting some of these questions.)
To appreciate stereographs, you need to view them in their full glory in three dimensions. There are several ways that you can view stereographs:
The best way to understand stereographs is to examine them directly so that you can scrutinize their details and get a sense of them as physical objects. To determine whether a library near you has stereographs, try searching for “stereograph” in WorldCat, which aggregates records from thousand of libraries. So that you only get records for primary sources, limit the type of search to “Archival Materials” and “Visual Materials.” You can also restrict your search to a particular library or to libraries in your area. Several institutions have provided online access to selections of their stereograph collections, including the Library of Congress and the Smithstonian Institution. You can also purchase original stereographs on web sites such as eBay and at antique stores; the cost of a stereograph can range from $1 to over $300.
Francis Frith Stereocards of Egypt. National Museum of Photography, Film and Television. 12 August 2006. http://www.nmpft.org.uk/insight/collectiononline_selection.asp?exid=27
A selection of images from Frith’s important 1862 book, Egypt, Nubia and Ethiopia IIllustrated.
G. Eric and Edith Matson Photograph Collection. Library of Congress. 12 August 2006. http://lcweb2.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/S?pp/matpc:@field(SUBJ+(Stereographs)).
Includes over 4000 stereographs of the Middle East.
Keystone Mast Collection. University of California Riverside/California Museum of Photography. 12 August 2006. http://www.cmp.ucr.edu/mainFrame/collections/guides/kmast/
The archive of the Keystone View Company (1892-1963), with 350,000 stereoscopic prints and negatives (only a fraction of that number are currently online).
Small Town America: Stereoscopic Views from the Robert Dennis Collection, 1850-1920. New York Public Library. American Memory. 12 August 2006. http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/award97/nyplhtml/dennhome.html
Includes 12,000 images of New York, New Jersey, and Connecticut from the 1850s to the 1910s from the Robert N. Dennis Collection of Stereoscopic Views at the New York Public Library.
Stereographs Selection. Smithstonian Institution Research System. 12 August 2006. http://sirismm.si.edu/siris/stereographtop.htm
Includes the Underwood & Underwood Glass Stereograph Collection, consisting of 28,000 glass plate negatives.
Stereographs and Postcards. American Antiquarian Society. 12 August 2006. http://www.americanantiquarian.org/stereographs.htm
The American Antiquarian Society has one of the leading stereograph collections in the US, with 50,000-60,000 stereographs.
Stereo Views. George Eastman House. 12 August 2006. http://www.geh.org/stereo.html
Includes works by over 80 stereo photographers and publishers.
Stereoview cards from our Photo Archives. San Diego Historical Society. 12 August 2006. http://www.sandiegohistory.org/collections/stereocards/stereocard.htm
Focuses on images of California.
Few scholarly studies of stereographs have been published. To locate a book on stereography, search for a Library of Congress subject heading such as “Photography, Stereoscopic,” “Photography, Stereoscopic -- History,”or “Photography – history.” To find a book regardless of whether your library holds it, use WorldCat. If your library does not own a work you need, you can probably request it through interlibrary loan.
Clarke, Graham, The Photograph. Oxford: Oxford UP, 1997.
A good general work on photography, with sections on “reading” photographs, the history of photography, photographic technologies, and genres.
Darrah, William. The World of Stereographs. Gettysburg, PA: Darrah, 1977.
Especially useful for identify and categorizing stereograph. Full of details about how stereographs were made, the themes depicted in stereographs, and the publishers of stereographs.
Davis, Melody D. “An Essential Reprint in Stereography.” Art Journal, 57.3 (1998): 94-96. JSTOR.
In this review of William Darrah’s The World of Stereographs, Davis examines why stereographs have been more or less ignored by historians of photography and makes a case for their cultural significance.
Earle, Edward, ed. Points of View: The Stereograph in America-A Cultural History. Rochester, NY: Visual Studies Workshop Press, 1979.
Evans, Elaine A. “In The Sandals of Pharaoh: James Henry Breasted and the Stereoscope.” McClung Museum. 9 August 2006. http://mcclungmuseum.utk.edu/newresearch/stereoscope/stereoscope.htm
Museum curator Elaine Evans examines the history of James Henry Breasted’s interest in stereoscopy and the production of his Egypt through the Stereoscope.
Fowles, Jib. “Stereography and the standardization of vision.” Journal of American Culture. 17.2 (1994): 89-94.
Analyzes how stereographs shaped how nineteenth-century Americans viewed the world.
Goldwyn, Craig. Stereographer.com. 13 August 2006. http://stereographer.com/
A contemporary stereographer has established a web site with information about stereograph viewers, cameras, and contemporary artists.
Hoelscher, Steven. “The Photographic Construction of Tourist Space in Victorian America.” Geographical Review. 88.4 (1998): 548-570. JSTOR.
Holmes, Oliver Wendell. The Stereoscope and Stereoscopic Photographs. New York and London: Underwood & Underwood, 1906.
Stereograph company Underwood and Underwood published a number of books promoting stereography, including a collection of essays on the subject by Oliver Wendell Holmes. Holmes’ essay “The Stereoscope and the Stereograph,” which was originally published in Atlantic Monthly (1859), is also available online at http://www.humanities.ualberta.ca/VIEW/Resources/Stereoscope.htm
Long, Burke O. Imagining the Holy Land: Maps, Models, and Fantasy Travels. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2003.
This scholarly book examines reconstructions of the Holy Land by Americans and includes a chapter on stereographs.
Silverman, Robert. “The Stereoscope and Photographic Depiction in the 19th Century.” Technology and Culture 34.4 (1993): 729-756. JSTOR.
Examines the technologies of stereography and the debate over the accuracy of representation and whether the human eye and imagination are superior to devices such as the stereoscope.
Van De Mieroop, Marc "Breasted, James Henry,” American National Biography Online Feb. 2000. 13 August 2006. http://www.anb.org/articles/14/14-00069.html
American National Biography is an essential reference work for information about important Americans. There are also biographical reference works profiling people from other countries, such as the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (focusing on British subjects), the Dictionary of German National Biography, and the Biographical Dictionary of Japanese History. For more on researching biography, see Identifying Historical Figures: The Souvenir of Egypt.
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More about this content | Cite this content | Version history
This work is licensed by Lisa Spiro under a Creative Commons License, and is an Open Educational Resource.
Last edited by Lisa Spiro on Oct 30, 2006 8:58 pm US/Central.