sierra leone, 1787-1987 || photography in sierra leone, 1850-1918

International African Institute

Photography in Sierra Leone, 1850-1918Author(s): Vera Viditz-WardSource: Africa: Journal of the International African Institute, Vol. 57, No. 4, Sierra Leone,1787-1987 (1987), pp. 510-518Published by: Cambridge University Press on behalf of the International African InstituteStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/1159896 .

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Africa 57 (4), 1987

PHOTOGRAPHY IN SIERRA LEONE, 1850-1918

Vera Viditz-Ward

In recent years scholars have shown considerable interest in the early use of photography by non-Western peoples. Research on nineteenth-century Indian, Japanese and Chinese photography has revealed a rich synthesis of European and Asian imagery. These early photographs show how non- Western peoples created new forms of artistic expression by adapting European technology and visual idioms for their own purposes. Because of the long history of contact between Sierra Leoneans and Europeans, Freetown seemed a logical starting point for similar photographic research in West Africa. The information presented here is based on ten years of searching for nineteenth-century photographs made by Sierra Leonean photographers. To locate these pictures, I have visited Freetonians and viewed their family portraits and photograph albums, interviewed contemporary photographers throughout Sierra Leone, and researched in the various colonial archives in England to locate photographs preserved from the period of colonial rule. I have discovered that a community of African photographers has worked in the city of Freetown since the very invention of photography. The article reviews the first phase of this unique photographic tradition, 1850-1918, and focuses on several of the African photographers who worked in Freetown during this period.

In 1839 the daguerreotype was presented to the world as a gift of the government of France. This early form of photography involved complicated procedures and cumbersome equipment. Daguerreotypes were made on copper plates coated with silver. The silver was treated to be made light-sensitive; the plate was exposed in the camera; and the latent image was developed in mercury fumes. Making an exposure lasted anywhere from thirty minutes to an hour in bright sunlight, and the subject had to remain absolutely still. Once the image had been made permanent, it was mounted under glass in a small, velvet-lined, hinged leather case. Each mirror-like image was unique and non-reproducible. Described as a victory for both science and art, the daguerreotype endured for more than a decade and revolutionised image-making both practically and conceptually.

The appearance of photography in the mid-nineteenth century was opportune to say the least. The public in Europe and America wanted to see the exotic and mysterious peoples and places that were the subjects of military campaigns and innumerable romantic paintings and novels. Also, the nineteenth-century concepts of realism, materialism and scientific method created an intellectual need for objective or scientific imagery. Daguerreotypists immediately exploited the new medium's ability to repro- duce reality, and the more adventurous embarked to document foreign lands visited by only a few Europeans.

Late in 1839 French daguerreotypists were travelling to North Africa, the Middle East and South America to photograph architecture, landscapes and ruins. The British and some Americans were soon to follow to India and Australia. It was through these early photographers that the medium was introduced on the African continent. Since the most practical and direct



PHOTOGRAPHY IN SIERRA LEONE

route to India and Australia was round the Cape of Good Hope, the daguerreotype process was introduced to South Africa as early as 1840. Ships travelling to Cape Town always stopped at various ports of call along the West African coast, and photography was certainly introduced to coastal West Africa before 1845 through contact with these ships and the daguerreotypists travelling on them.

Freetown was a major West African port of call by the mid-nineteenth century. It was a thriving city, called by its inhabitants 'the Athens of West Africa'-and, indeed, their civic pride was justified. Missionaries had built several secondary schools and a teacher training institution, which was to become the first university college in West Africa. Business was active between the enterprising Creole merchants and traders arriving from other African and European countries. Social events included lectures, concerts, plays, horse races, charity balls and Victorian high teas. Several local newspapers kept the public informed of international news, which arrived regularly by ship. Since Creoles travelled often to Britain and Europe, what information did not reach the city through other channels was sure to arrive with a returning Freetonian.

In 1879 Fourah Bay College awarded its first degrees in conjunction with the University of Durham; by 1890 a considerable number of Creoles had qualified in England as barristers, medical doctors, teachers and ministers; in 1895 a Creole lawyer was knighted by Queen Victoria. In such a sophisticated environment it is not surprising that photography took root quite early. The first professional Freetown photographers were probably itinerant merchants who travelled between the main ports of the West African coast. Although circumstantial evidence suggests the existence of African daguerreotypes in Freetown by the mid-1840s, the earliest documentary evidence I have, thus far, dates to 1857. A newspaper advertisement in the New Era that year announced the arrival in Freetown of a daguerreotypist named A. Washing- ton, who had worked in the United States and Liberia.2 Other documentary sources show that he was a black American. No daguerreotypes by Washing- ton or by any other photographer from this period have yet been discovered and, unfortunately, they are not likely to be. Daguerreotypes from northern and southern Africa exist today, since those areas are located in climates with average humidity. Freetown's location in a tropical environment, which receives over 200 in. of rainfall each year, would cause moisture, fungus and bacteria to grow between the layers of glass and eventually destroy any daguerreotypes from Freetown, unless they were removed to a less destruc- tive climate.

The 1850s brought numerous technical innovations, making photography more practical and economical. A positive/negative photographic process had been discovered in 1841, which used paper to make negative images. The calotype, as it was called, was less cumbersome than the daguerreotype. While daguerreotype images were unique and non-reproducible, many positive images could be made from one calotype negative. Owing to patent restrictions and the limited durability of a calotype negative, the process enjoyed only a brief life among a small number of photographers. The collodion wet-plate negative process superseded the calotype in the 1850s. It involved a rectangular glass plate with one side coated with a sticky film of

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ECOLOGY AND TECHNOLOGY

collodion. While the collodion was still wet the plate was made light- sensitive, exposed, developed and fixed for permanence. The collodion process produced a sharper and more permanent image than the calotype, and thousands of positives could be made from one negative. During this period albumen paper was invented, which used egg whites as a vehicle for light-sensitive compounds. It produced very fine, detailed, positive images with a glossy finish. Albumen paper was very durable, and today one can find old albumen photographs in Freetown still in excellent condition.

Even with these innovations, the nineteenth-century photographer required a formidable array of equipment and chemicals. Cameras were large and cumbersome in order to accommodate the standard glass negative sizes of 8 x 10 in. or 16 x 20 in. Photographers coated and sensitised their own glass negatives immediately before exposing them. Chemicals, bottles, trays and glass plates were necessary for sensitisation. Since the collodion plate required total processing while still wet, a darkroom or light-resistant tent was essential during the entire procedure.

By the 1850s there were African and some European portrait photographers who ran permanent studios or travelled as itinerant photographers among the West African coastal towns. But most of the Europeans making photographs came to Africa in capacities other than that of photographers. Backed by institutions such as the Royal Geographical Society, maritime expeditions, or the Colonial Office, these soldiers, scholars and adventurers documented the peoples and places they were sent to observe. The Euro- peans brought up-to-date technology and the latest photographic styles, and they frequently left behind both equipment and technical knowledge with their African assistants and colleagues. After the invention of the snapshot camera in 1889 there were also many African and European amateur photographers in West Africa, taking pictures as a pastime.

Africans had established permanent photography studios in Freetown by at least the late 1860s. In that decade newspaper advertisements appeared for local studios which made photographic portraits and frequently sold photographic chemicals and supplies ordered from Liverpool. News articles from the British Journal of Photography were occasionally reprinted in the Freetown papers, and Freetonians appear to have been quite interested in the variety of photographic methods available at the time. Indeed, the text of one 1881 advertisement presents an astounding variety of locally available photographic processes:

Pictures of the best quality will be produced by the company in the following processes, viz: The Gelatine Instantaneous Process, The Platinum Type Process; The Improved Daguerreotype Process, The Woodbury Type Process, The Albert Type Process, The Imperishable Carbon Process, The Art Silver Printing Process etc. etc.3

Shadrack Albert St John, who placed this advertisement, was one of the many Creole studio photographers working in Freetown in the 1880s. E. Albert Lewis, J. Nutwoode Hamilton, Nicholas May, Tom Johnson and Dionysius Leomy also advertised their studios during this period. Each of these photographers offered work in the contemporary European formats of carte-de-visite (3 x 5 in.) or cabinet photographs (5 x 7 in.). Another service

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most studios offered was the sale of landscape photographs, urban scenes of Freetown, and photographs of 'native types' from the hinterlands. These pictures were purchased by Freetonians and expatriates for their personal photograph albums. Whether in London or Freetown, the family album was an essential part of the respectable Victorian parlour.

Very little biographical information exists pertaining to these early photographers. The newspaper advertisement of S. Albert St. John states that he learned photography in London and also photographed in the Gambia. Nicholas May was the brother of a prominent Creole headmaster, and E. Albert Lewis worked as a trader and professional photographer. The only extant photographs from this group were made by Dionysius Leomy, who worked in Freetown from the late 1880s into the early 1900s. There are several examples of Leomy's photographs at the Methodist Missionary Archives (SOAS) in London and in Freetown at the Sierra Leone Museum. Leomy's photographs are easily identifiable by his name, printed diagonally in the lower right-hand corner of each albumen print. His most interesting photographs are Freetown street scenes in which he captures the vitality of market women and hawkers as they sell their wares. He also seems to have specialised in 'bird's-eye view' photographs of Freetown streets. These images were in demand by people who collected photographs for their album or who wanted a souvenir of Freetown.

Another photographer of this period was J. P. Decker. It is not clear whether Decker ran a studio in Freetown, but his work exists in two albums-one in the Sierra Leone Museum and a duplicate in the Common- wealth Library in London. Decker was commissioned locally on a directive from the Colonial Office in London to document British colonial head- quarters in Freetown, Bathurst, the Cape coast, the Gold Coast and Nigeria. The images are primarily of government buildings and military structures. Decker's skill and technical control are consistently apparent in his architectural photographs, and his artistic ability is reflected in his composition and vantage points.

One of the most important early innovations in photography was the development of the gelatine dry-plate negative in the late 1870s. Gelatine was substituted for collodion on the glass negative. The gelatine was sensitive enough for faster exposure times and did not have to be processed immediately after exposure. Negative plates could now be purchased already sensitised and then stored in light-tight boxes until needed. Cameras were becoming smaller and more portable, and by 1889 the first snapshot cameras were available to the general public.

These innovations made the itinerant photographer's life considerably easier. Photographers continued to travel through Freetown on their way to or from such places as the Gambia, Liberia and the Gold Coast. They usually appeared in Freetown around Christmas and again in May or June before the rainy season made travel more difficult. Their stay would last a few weeks; besides making portraits, itinerants frequently sold photographs of other countries they visited in West Africa, and supplies and equipment to local photographers.

In May 1893 the following advertisement appeared on the front page of the Sierra Leone Times:

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W. S. Johnston, photographer begs to inform the public that he is prepared during his visiting tour to Sierra Leone, which will only extend to a few weeks, to receive sitters at };s residence in Howe Street and to solicit their kind patronage. Specimens can be seen during business hours: 7 to 11 a.m. and 1 to 5 p.m. Pictures of all sizes are taken. Negatives kept. Copies may be had always. Landscapes, views of the Gold Coast, Lagos, Sierra Leone and Native Types are always on hand.

Charges moderate.4

A second advertisement appeared in July 1893 in which Johnston thanked his patrons and announced the intention of making his stay permanent. Freetown photographers must have enjoyed an active business if an itinerant was able to settle permanently after only two months of work. Biographical data on Johnston are sparse. He may have been Liberian; more likely, he was an itinerant Creole photographer who was finally able to establish a permanent business at home. Whatever the situation, the success of his Freetown studio is evidenced by the fact that he was ultimately able to turn the business over to his sons.

Johnston's photographs can be found in archives in London and in private collections in Freetown. Dating from the 1880s to about 1910, they cover a vast array of subjects, ranging from baby pictures, to group portraits, to the 1910 visit of the Duke and Duchess of Connaught. All his photographs show consistent high quality in terms of artistic composition and technical execution.

The building of the railway by the British into the newly declared protectorate in the late 1890s opened up new areas for enterprising Freetown photographers. By 1908 the railway reached east from Freetown almost 200 miles through the interior, opening up countryside and villages that were previously isolated. Photographs of village scenes and protectorate people were in high demand by local citizens and visitors to Freetown, who would purchase these photos for their private albums or send them home as souvenir photographic postcards.

An album of such postcards was given to the Royal Colonial Institute in 1903 by Isaac W. Paris of Paris & Co., photographers, Freetown. The twenty-four photographs are divided between Freetown and the protectorate. The images of Freetown are of its parks, the tree-lined avenues to the Governor's residence, the memorial churches and the prosperous shops. These tranquil and urbane images are contrasted with photographs of the wild tropical landscape of the protectorate and pictures of village life, including weavers, village chiefs, Bundu dancers and masked devils. These protectorate images were, no doubt, as exotic and unusual to most Free- tonians as they were to the Europeans viewing them. Until the railway was built, travel from the colony into the interior of Sierra Leone was quite difficult; unless there was a specific reason for such travel, most Freetonians preferred to remain in the city. Today one can still find copies of these turn-of-the-century postcards in London archives and in antique book and postcard shops in the UK.

The work of one photographer appears frequently in archival collections from the period just prior to World War I. The photographer, Alphonso Lisk-Carew, was born in Freetown in 1887, and probably started his

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PLATE 1 Studio portrait of woman in PLATE 2 Studio portrait of woman in

European dress, Freetown, c. 1850-60 Kaba slot, head tie and Aku country cloth, Sierra Leone, c. 1860

PLATE 3 Market scene, Freetown, c. 1870-80



PLATE 4 Market scene, Freetown, c. 1870-80

PLATE 5 Water Street vegetable market, Freetown, 1869



PLATE o Gape 3zerra igntnouse, rreetown, la6o

PLATE 7 Landing stage, Freetown, 1869



PLATE 8 The Broderick family, Freetown, c. 1895



PLATE 9 Sally Thomas and grandson, Freetown, c. 1900



PLATE 10 The Baker family, Freetown, c. 1918



PLATE 11 Freetown botanical gardens, c. 1880s

PLATE 12 Memento mori photograph of a child, Freetown, c. 1905



PLATE 13 Studio portrait of young men, Freetown, c. 1918




photographic career in the first decade of this century. He was very active in the Creole community, devoting much time and energy to his church, to Freetown politics, and to his private business ventures. During his career as a photographer Lisk-Carew also owned a fancy goods store and a cinema, and he introduced the motorised bicycle to Freetown. He was popular and financially successful.

Lisk-Carew's greatest success was his photography studio. An early albumen print shows his large two-storey studio building with framed photographs displayed on the open doors and a large sign stating his name and business. His photographic output was extensive and diverse. Studio portraits of Creoles and expatriates are found alongside images of native life and landscapes. His zeal for photographing Freetown is especially evident. One finds image after image of urban panoramas, the harbour, markets, factories, bicycle tracks, and many other urban scenes that caught his discerning eye. Most of his early images are albumen prints made with the standard 8 x 10 in. view camera, although several of his harbour photographs and landscapes from the protectorate were made with a special panoramic camera.

Lisk-Carew's vantage points are varied. At times he fills the entire frame with a building, mountain or waterfall. Other images are wide-angle shots with the subject off-centre and in the distance. His photographs from the protectorate tend to be less formally posed and more thoughtful than those of his contemporaries. When the Duke and Duchess of Connaught visited in 1910 Lisk-Carew was the official photographer. His success was such that, afterwards, each photograph he produced carried the stamp 'Patronized by HRH the Duke of Connaught'. Eventually his photographs bore an embos- sed stamp with the lion and the unicorn above the words 'Lisk-Carew Brothers, Freetown, Sierra Leone'.

Alphonso Lisk-Carew's success was not achieved single-handed. Being part of a large Creole family gave him the support needed to sustain such an active business. About 1914 his stamps began to read, 'Lisk-Carew Brothers'. The brother was Arthur, and the extent of his contribution to the enterprise is not clear. Perhaps, while Alphonso was actually making photographs, Arthur was managing the studio or printing Alphonso's negatives. What is certain is that Alphonso Lisk-Carew became famous in Sierra Leone for his photography and that his reputation has extended even to the present day. In 1970 the University of Sierra Leone mounted a retrospective exhibition of Lisk-Carew photographs, praising the man as an 'artist' and his work as 'striking and original'.5

Lisk-Carew was a nexus between the Freetown photographers of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. The changing relationship between Sierra Leone and her colonial rulers, the two world wars and national independence all helped to focus positive attention on Sierra Leone's African cultural heritage. The changes in attitude and self-perception enabled Freetown photographers to begin developing a distinctive photographic tradition with both European and African influences. Although the materials and equipment used by local photographers continued to be of Western design and manufacture, the aesthetics of the photographic image began to be dictated by local African styles. Freetown studio backdrops were no longer

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painted to imitate European parlours or street scenes, but were now local artist's paintings of Freetown, of village scenes or of mosques. Locally made country cloth, gara and woven mats became popular backgrounds for studio photographs. The concept of what made a good photograph was no longer based on formal European poses but, instead, on the local styles, using double exposure and split imaging. The photographic trade was kept alive and vital over the decades by Freetown photographers who constantly devised new photographic styles to please their clients.

During the period 1850-1918 Freetown photographers acquired extensive skill and knowledge of European photographic processes, and some were master craftsmen whose work can stand beside the best in Europe and America of the period. But these photographers had yet to develop a photographic vision which would be distinctly African or Sierra Leonean. The early period is none the less important, as it formed the basis of a truly African photography that emerged in this century and still exists as a living tradition in modern Sierra Leone.

THE PHOTOGRAPHS

1. Studio portrait of woman in European dress, Freetown, c. 1850-60. Carte-de- visite, photographer possibly Francis W. Joaque. The carte-de-visite was a popular format from about 1850 through the 1860s. Private collection.

2. Studio portrait of woman in Kaba slot, head tie and Aku country cloth, Sierra Leone, c. 1860. Albumen print, photographer unknown. Itinerant portrait photographers travelled with portable studios which usually included painted canvas backdrops depicting classical or European scenes. The photograph could have been taken in Freetown or perhaps in a village along the coast between Freetown and Monrovia. Sierra Leone Museum collection.

3. Market scene, Freetown c. 1870-80. Albumen print, photographer Dionysius Leomy. Spontaneous images such as this were difficult to capture before the invention of snapshot cameras and faster film in the late 1880s. Leomy appears to have specialised in this sort of candid photography. Sierra Leone Museum collection.

4. Market scene, Freetown, c. 1870-80. Albumen print, photographer Dionysius Leomy. Photographs such as this one and No. 3 were usually made for sale to visiting expatriates and Freetonians for their photo albums. Sierra Leone Museum collection.

5. Water Street vegetable market, Freetown, 1869. Albumen print, photographer J. P. Decker. Decker was commissioned by the colonial authorities to record various buildings and districts of the capital. The photographs, forty-six in all, were mounted in two albums, one for London, the other to remain in Freetown. Sierra Leone Museum collection.

6. Cape Sierra lighthouse, south-eastern view, Freetown, 1869. Albumen print, photographer J. P. Decker. Sierra Leone Museum collection.

7. Landing stage, Freetown, showing the harbourmaster's office and customs shed, 1869. Albumen print, photographer J. P. Decker. Sierra Leone Museum collection.

8. The Broderick family, Freetown, c. 1895. Albumen print, photographer possibly W. S. Johnston. Collection of Dr S. M. Broderick, Freetown.

9. Sally Thomas and grandson, Freetown, c. 1900. Albumen print, photographer W. S. Johnston. Private collection.

10. The Baker family, Freetown, c. 1918. Albumen print, photographer W. S. Johnston studio. This family group was taken after Johnston had expanded the

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business around 1910 to include his sons. When the photograph was framed the photographer's card was inserted incorrectly on the front of the mount instead of being glued to the back. Private collection.

11. Freetown botanical gardens, c. 1880s. Albumen print, photographer W. S. Johnston. An early and rare landscape. It is signed on the back in pencil, indicating that he most likely made it before he had an established studio. Private collection.

12. Memento mori photograph of a child, Freetown, c. 1905. Albumen print, photographer A. Lisk-Carew. The photograph was made before Lisk-Carew had taken his brother Arthur into partnership. Memento mori photographs are still taken in Freetown today, and several contemporary photographers specialise in this work. Private collection.

13. Studio portrait of young men, Freetown, c. 1918. Albumen print, photographer Lisk-Carew Bros. Backdrops such as that used here became less popular with customers after the Great War. They were replaced by backdrops made of country cloth, gara, woven mats or canvas painted with scenes from Freetown. Private collection.

NOTES

1 Fyfe (1962): 459. 2 New Era (Freetown), 29 June 1857. 3 Watchman (Freetown), 25 October 1881. 4 Sierra Leone Times, 6 May 1893. 5 University of Sierra Leone, Exhibition of Sierra Leoneana, 1895-1970, section 26.

REFERENCES

Barger, M. Susan. 1980. Bibliography of Photographic Processes used before 1880. Rochester, N.Y.: Graphic Arts Research Center.

Bensusan, A. D. 1966. Silver Images: history of photography in Africa. Cape Town: Howard Timmons.

Fyfe, Christopher. 1955. 'The administration in 1885', Sierra Leone Studies, n.s., 4 (June): 226-8. 1962. A History of Sierra Leone. London: Oxford University Press.

Matthews, Noel. 1971. Materials for West African History in the Archives of the United Kingdom. London: Oxford University Press.

Newhall, Beaumont. 1982. The History of Photography. New York: Museum of Modem Art.

Rosenblum, Naomie. 1985. A World of Photography. New York: Abrams. Sprague, Stephen. 1978. 'Yoruba photography: how Yoruba see themselves', African

Arts, XII, 1 (November): 52-9. Viditz-Ward, Vera. 1985. 'Alphonso Lisk-Carew, Creole Photographer', African Arts,

XIX, 1 (November): 46-51. Worswick, Clark. 1978. Imperial China Photographs, 1850-1912. New York: Pen-

wick/Crown Books. - 1979. Japan Photographs, 1854-1905. New York: Random House.

1976. The Last Empire: photography in British India, 1855-1911. Millerton, N.Y.: Aperture.

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518 ECOLOGY AND TECHNOLOGY

Resumer

La photographie au Sierra Leone, 1850-1918

Des les annees 1860, des studios de photographie de portraits furent etablis par les habitants de Freetown au Sierra Leone. Ils utilisaient des technologies de pointe et les tout derniers styles de photographie. II reste tres peu de donnees biographiques sur ces premiers photographes de Freetown, ainsi que tres peu sur leurs photographies. Cet article passe en revue tout ce que l'on connait sur la periode initiale de l'histoire de la photographie au Sierra Leone et place ces connaissances dans leur contexte technologique. Une selection de treize photographies a ete reproduite (avec titres detailles), pour illustrer l'etendue des travaux effectues au cours de cette periode et pour montrer les styles developpes par certains des grands studios de Freetown.



sierra leone, 1787-1987 || photography in sierra leone, 1850-1918

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