Henry Peach Robinson

Raj Lalwani discusses the work of Henry Peach Robinson and marvels at how this pictorialist’s thought process influences photography even today.

- Raj Lalwani

The beauty of tracing the history of photography is in discovering how everything seems to be connected. The life of Henry Peach Robinson has a string of such clues. His work and thoughts define some of the most important concepts in photography today.

Robinson started off as a painter. When he was just 21, his painting was hung at the Royal Academy in London, a remarkable achievement for that time. This was in 1852, the same year he discovered the rather young art form of that time—photography.

Going Beyond the Medium Because of his background in painting, Robinson was dissatisfied by the apparent limitations of photography. Why did it just have to be about documentation? Did it have to really show what lay in front? Or could it conjure up dreams and magic, the way the imagination of a painter’s hand could? These painterly leanings led him to collaborate with Oscar Gustave Rejlander, a pioneering art photographer who was the first person to combine multiple (32, to be precise) images into one final ‘montaged combination print’.

However, while Rejlander was the actual pioneer in this case, it was Henry Peach Robinson who recognised the significance of what had just been achieved. The final image was no more dependent on the subject, but was in control of the photographer. One could not just take, but also make an image. Recognising this potential, he went about conceptualising and creating photomontages.

The Creation of Truth