This companion web site for an exhibition at the British Library is difficult to browse, but never the less offers a look at some fascinating images from the pages of some of first books to be illustrated with photographs and photographically produced prints, published in England beginning in the mid-nineteenth century. Examples such as Philip Henry Delamotte's photos of the Crystal Palace, an exhibition hall originally built for the first universal fair held in Hyde Park in 1851, and dismantled and reconstructed in Sydenham after the fair closed. Delamotte's photos document not only advances in printing technology, but also architecture and recreation. The former fair building re-opened in 1854 to become a national entertainment center for the British public, at least until it burned down in 1936. Other highlighted curator's choices include pastoral landscapes and waterways as well as scenes of industry, such as J.C. Burrow's photographs of mines and miners, which Burrow photographed using his own flashlight techniques.
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