New museum exhibit highlights early days of pictures in New Bedford

A brand new exhibition on the New Bedford Whaling Museum will present a robust window into the world of pictures within the 1800s and the lives of individuals residing on this area throughout that interval via the lenses of native photographers.  

“Look Pleasant, Please”: Early Portrait Photography in New Bedford will function greater than 300 portraits taken between 1839, when pictures was invented, and 1900, when pictures was accessible to a broader viewers.

Sponsored partially by The William Wood Foundation, the exhibition will likely be on view from Jan. 16 to Sept. 7 within the museum’s Wattles Gallery.

“This exhibition celebrates the studio photographers who moved the medium forward in New Bedford and examines the unique cultural landscape that unfolded around them,” mentioned Naomi Slipp, the Douglas and Cynthia Crocker Endowed Chair for the chief curator and director of museum studying on the New Bedford Whaling Museum.

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Exhibition tells the story of a crucial period of New Bedford’s history

Slipp said the exhibition will show how photography grew as both an art form and a business during a period of substantial changes in New Bedford and provide a glimpse into the experiences of people who sat for portraits during that time.

“From 1840 to 1900, in New Bedford, the population grows five times over because of whaling and the textile industry, with much of the new population coming from immigrants,” Slipp said. “The textile industry was a big driver. Between 1880 and 1900, the city population tripled. So, it’s a huge change in who the population is here in the city, and photography becomes a way to kind of see all that change.”

“Look Pleasant, Please” will function totally different sorts of pictures from a really prolific period, when there have been greater than 200 photographers working in New Bedford.

On view will likely be daguerreotypes (unfavourable photos printed on silver coated copper plates), ambrotypes (images on glass), tintypes (photographs on skinny sheets of lacquered iron), carte-de-visites (small images mounted on cardstock), cupboard playing cards (a bigger model of the carte-de-visites), gelatin silver prints (black-and-white images created from movie negatives, utilizing light-sensitive silver salts suspended in gelatin coated on paper), and albums.

“From the primary feminine photographer within the space, to a Black photographer for whom Frederick Douglass sat, this assortment tells the story of an important interval in our metropolis’s historical past,” Slipp mentioned. “There are a significant number of Portuguese and Portuguese-descended sitters and [Azorean photographer] Manuel Goulart and his brother are both featured as one of the three big photo studios represented.”

The exhibition was named after native photographer George F. Parlow, who typically requested his topics to “look pleasant, please.”

Exhibition highlights

One of the highlights of the show is a rare smiling portrait of Frederick Douglass taken in 1895 by prominent Black photographer James E. Reed.

The exhibition will include 40 to 50 photographs taken by the Goulart brothers. Azorean-born Manuel Goulart moved at the age of 23 to New Bedford, where he built frames, learned photography, studied the printing business of Charles Taber & Company and opened his own studio in the 1890s.

Over several decades, he traveled to the Azores and mainland Portugal and collaborated with his brother José, who opened a photo studio in Horta, Faial, in 1900.

Manuel Goulart’s large studio camera will be one of the first objects visitors will see when they enter the exhibition. His camera stand will also be on view.

“There are also things that relate to the studio that he operated in Faial and the studio that his brother ran as well,” Slipp mentioned. “So, you get this sense of the brothers between the Azores and New Bedford, and how they practiced photography with the community here, which I think is a really interesting part of that whole story.”

Some photographs captured by Hannah H. Worthing, the area’s first feminine photographer, will reveal how pictures provided a route to success for individuals who might need had few choices in any other case. 

Slipp mentioned numerous these photographs are being framed for the exhibition. Some of the photographs will likely be displayed on standing circumstances and wall circumstances, whereas others will likely be positioned on look-down tables.

“They’re nearly totally from our assortment; there’s about two dozen which might be loans,” Slipp defined. “We are very lucky to have the majority of the studio contents for Goulart as well as for Reed. That means we do have their negatives and a lot of their studio equipment… We’re doing some light boxes so you can look at the negatives as well.”

Who are the sitters?

The photos on display recorded faces, families, and communities as New Bedford’s population grew exponentially and became more diversified.

“They give kind of a snapshot of the community,” Slipp said. “A lot of the photographs that we have, we don’t know who the sitters are or the photographer. So, there’s an interesting question there about, you know, who are the other people that might have been practicing photography.”

These portraits were treasured, shared, and kept as reminders of loved ones.

Among these photographed are a Union soldier, crew members from the Schooner Mary Adelaide, whaling captains, First Communion youngsters, {couples} on their wedding ceremony day, and other people normally.

“By 1870 and 1880, most people would have been able to have a photograph taken of them,” Slipp said. “Photographs were relatively affordable. For many, it was the first time they could have a lasting picture of themselves.”

Many sitters featured in the exhibition are of Portuguese or Cape Verdean origin.

Although not all of them have been recognized, in some situations their tales are recognized. Such is the case of Manuel E. Costa and his spouse Filomena Nunes Costa. A local of the island of Faial, Costa left the Azores at age 13 to start a profession in American whaling, which might final 47 years. He rose rapidly to grasp, commanding 11 voyages, largely from New Bedford. On quite a few these voyages, he was accompanied by his spouse.

“The present stops round 1900, when Kodak invents a handheld digital camera and other people can begin taking their very own photos they usually much less typically are going to photograph studios to have their photos taken,” Slipp defined.

One of the albums that will be on display belonged to Henry Dudley Prescott, a local physician who enjoyed taking photos of his family, friends and their outings.

Interactive component

In conjunction with the exhibition, an interactive photography studio in the gallery will invite visitors to take and share a portrait of themselves, and ask, “How do we choose to look pleasant today?”

The unique backdrops can be found for guests to {photograph} themselves utilizing their very own telephones or cameras.

“There will likely be a mounted ring gentle, and you should utilize your personal digital camera to take your personal images,” Slipp mentioned. “We’re reproducing the huge studio backdrops from one of the photo studios here in New Bedford. So, you can pretend you’re taking your photo in the studio. I think there will be a lot to keep people engaged.”

For extra details about the exhibition, go to