Special Historical Feature — Cape Town, circa 1908
Cape Town has long stood at the southern gateway of empire, welcoming steamships, telegraphs, and the latest mechanical wonders from Europe. Now another astonishing invention has arrived upon our shores — the art of colour photography, a scientific achievement which promises to transform journalism, portraiture, and the illustrated press forever.
For nearly seventy years the camera has faithfully recorded the world only in shades of black and white. Since the first photographic experiments of the 1830s and 1840s, newspapers throughout the British Empire, including those of the Cape Colony, relied upon engravings, lithographs, and later halftone reproductions to convey scenes of public life to readers. (Encyclopedia Britannica)
Yet scientists in Europe never abandoned the dream of capturing nature in her true colours. The earliest theories were advanced by the Scottish physicist James Clerk Maxwell, who in 1861 demonstrated a method of producing a coloured image by combining separate red, green, and blue photographic exposures. The resulting photograph of a tartan ribbon is today regarded by many scholars as the first true colour photograph ever made. (National Science and Media Museum)
French experimenters such as Edmond Becquerel had earlier attempted similar feats during the 1840s, though the processes proved delicate and impractical for ordinary use. (arXiv)
In recent years, however, remarkable advances have emerged from the laboratories and workshops of Europe. The Lumière brothers of France introduced the celebrated Autochrome process, whereby microscopic grains of dyed starch permit photographs to appear in vivid natural colour. This process has now begun appearing in journals and exhibitions throughout Britain and the Continent. (ExampleSite)
The Cape Colony, ever eager to keep pace with imperial progress, has not remained untouched by these developments. Photographic studios in Cape Town, Grahamstown, and Port Elizabeth have reportedly begun experimenting with hand-tinted portraiture and imported colour plates. Long before true colour photography became practical, local photographers often employed artists to delicately paint colour upon photographic cartes-de-visite in an effort to satisfy the public’s taste for realism. (The Heritage Portal)
Within the Cape press itself, editors and printers have shown growing fascination with the new medium. While the expense and technical difficulty of colour reproduction still prevent daily newspapers from printing full colour photographic pages, several illustrated colonial publications have begun discussing the possibility of incorporating coloured supplements for special editions and royal commemorations.
Printers attached to the great newspaper houses of Cape Town speak enthusiastically of a future in which readers may gaze upon scenes of Table Mountain, Adderley Street, and the bustling docks in their natural hues rather than in monochrome tones alone.
Indeed, the Cape has long possessed a distinguished connection with the science of photography. The eminent astronomer Sir John Herschel, during his residence at Feldhausen in Claremont during the 1830s, conducted experiments which greatly assisted the development of photographic chemistry. (Ancestry24)
Editors across the colony now predict that colour photography may one day revolutionise journalism itself. Battles, parliamentary ceremonies, agricultural exhibitions, and society events could all be preserved with unprecedented realism. The illustrated press, which once depended entirely upon artists’ sketches, may soon deliver scenes almost indistinguishable from life itself.
There remain obstacles, certainly. Exposure times are lengthy, colour plates costly, and printing methods imperfect. Yet few inventions of modern times have inspired such wonder among newspapermen and photographers alike.
As one Cape printer reportedly remarked upon viewing a colour plate newly arrived from London: “It is as though the world itself has stepped onto the page.”
And thus, from the laboratories of Europe to the bustling newspaper offices of the Cape Colony, the age of colour has begun.
Articles published from this day forward will be in full colour
