Biography (Courtesy of Christian Peterson)
 
H. P. Robinson was England’s first vocal proponent of "high art" photography during the late Victorian era. When not making commercial portraits, he was crafting anecdotal, narrative photographs, based on sentimental paintings and created from multiple negatives. He wrote many books and articles on the technique and aesthetics of photography, including his 1869 title Pictorial Effect in Photography. Most of his composite pictures precede pictorialism, making him more like the grandfather of the movement.
 
Henry Peach Robinson was born on July 9, 1830, at Linney, Ludlow, Shropshire. He finished his schooling at thirteen and in 1844 was apprenticed to a printer/bookseller in Ludlow for five years. He studied art, had some of his drawings reproduced in the Illustrated London News, and in 1852 saw one of his paintings accepted into the annual exhibition of the Royal Academy. During this time, he worked for a number of booksellers and publishers in London and elsewhere.
 
Robinson learned the daguerreotype process in 1850 from a photographer who had taken his portrait. A few years later, he began making calotypes and became increasingly enthusiastic about photography. In 1856, after studying the medium further for two years, he established a portrait studio in Leamington with a cousin of his. The next year, he was elected a member of the Photographic Society of London.
 
In 1858, Robinson produced his first major composite photograph, Fading Away, showing a dying girl surrounded by mourning figures. This image, now his signature piece, was exhibited at the Crystal Palace that year, received much attention, and increased his portrait business. Shortly thereafter, he started issuing one highly staged and moralistic composite photograph a year, usually picturing idyllic peasant life.
 
Robinson moved his portrait studio to larger premises in 1862, to accommodate his increased commercial and artistic work, but a few years later fell ill and closed it. He then moved to London in 1865 and began editorial work for the Photographic News. He wrote extensively for this periodical, plus others such as Practical Photographer and the British Journal of Photography.
 
In 1868, with his health improved, Robinson set up a new studio in Tunbridge Wells, Kent, with Nelson King Cherrill, who stayed with him for about seven years and helped produce exhibition pictures that were signed by both photographers. After being published in installments in Photographic News, Robinson’s first and most important book was issued in 1869. Pictorial Effect in Photography: Being Hints on Composition and Chiaroscuro for Photographers was so popular that it was translated into French and German and went into many editions and reprints. During the 1880s he wrote additional titles.
 
Due to another illness, H. P. Robinson summoned his son, Ralph Winwood Robinson, to help run his business in 1886 and two years later retired. However, he continued writing on photography, judging exhibitions, and showing his work. Solo exhibitions of his photographs were seen in the United States in 1890 in Boston and Philadelphia and the next year in Rochester.
 
He was active in organizations, such as the Tunbridge Wells Amateur Photographic Association. In 1892, Robinson helped found the important Linked Ring Brotherhood, by seceding with others from the conservative Photographic Society of Great Britain, in order to pursue artistic work. Until about 1900, Robinson was deeply involved in organizing the Linked Ring’s annual salon, acting as a judge and installing the shows. In 1900, he was unanimously elected as an honorary fellow of the Royal Photographic Society (Hon. FRPS).
 
Henry Peach Robinson suffered a paralytic seizure and some months later died, on February 21, 1901. He is buried in Tunbridge Wells.
 
Christian A. Peterson Pictorial Photography at the Minneapolis Institute of Arts (Christian A. Peterson: Privately printed, 2012)
 
This biography is courtesy and copyright of Christian Peterson and is included here with permission.
 
Date last updated: 1 June 2013.
 
Wikipedia
 
Henry Peach Robinson (9 July 1830, Ludlow, Shropshire - 21 February 1901, Royal Tunbridge Wells, Kent) was an English pictorialist photographer best known for his pioneering combination printing - joining multiple negatives or prints to form a single image; an early example of photomontage. He engaged in contemporary debates in the photographic press and associations about the legitimacy of 'art photography' and in particular the combining of separate images into one.