Salt Prints Initiative at Harvard

Date: 

Thursday, February 17, 2022, 12:00pm to 1:00pm

Location: 

Online - Zoom

Harvard Library Love Data Week 2022

Join us on Thursday, February 17th at 12pm EST to learn about the Weissman Preservation Center’s (WPC) university-wide project to preserve and enhance access to salt prints at Harvard. Salt prints represent the result of the first negative-to-positive photographic technique, introduced by Englishman William Henry Fox Talbot in 1839. Collections of salt prints found in libraries, archives, and museums across Harvard University include some of the earliest photographic images created, and they represent a seminal chapter in the history of photography. Together, these holdings reveal technological developments in the medium and pioneering uses of photography across the sciences and humanities.

To celebrate Love Data Week, Elena Bulat and Katie Mika will discuss the large-scale survey of photographs undertaken by WPC, Harvard Library Preservation Services; the data and metadata generated by the survey; the FTIR (Fourier Transform Infrared Spectroscopy) analysis of chemical coatings on the salted paper prints; and the curation process and potential reuses for the publicly shared data.

SpeakersElena Bulat, Photograph Conservator, Weissman Preservation Center, Harvard Library
Katie Mika, Data Services Librarian, Harvard Library

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