Charlotte Hill and David Octavius Hill [Group 141]
About this artwork
David Octavius Hill was a respected painter and secretary of the Royal Scottish Academy before he entered into the famous partnership with Robert Adamson. A handsome, sociable and cheerful man, Hill was much loved within Edinburgh society. In 1837 he married his first wife, Ann Macdonald, who died in 1841, leaving him a widower with an only child. Charlotte, nicknamed Chatty, was born in 1839 but died in her early twenties. This photograph shows the affection Hill felt for his daughter. At the same time, this particular pose provided a practical way of holding the child still, as exposure times for the early calotypes could run into several minutes.
Updated before 2020
see media-
artists:
-
title:Charlotte Hill and David Octavius Hill [Group 141]
-
date created:Probably 1843
-
materials:Salted paper print
-
measurements:16.60 x 12.60 cm
-
object type:
-
credit line:Edinburgh Photographic Society Collection, gifted 1987
-
accession number:PGP EPS 90
-
gallery:
-
depicted:
-
subject:
David Octavius Hill
David Octavius Hill
A painter and a lithographer by training, David Octavius Hill is best remembered for the beauty of the calotypes he and Robert Adamson produced together. Hill was a sociable and kind-hearted man who did much to support the arts in Scotland and between 1830 and 1836 he was the unpaid Secretary of...