Record Pictures: Photographs from the Archives of the Institution of Civil Engineers

Edited by Michael Collins

Before the invention of photography, civil engineers around the world employed topographic artists to record the progression of their projects.

Termed "record pictures," these illustrations followed the tradition of the Dutch topographical landscapes of the 17th century. They combined the qualities of detail and clarity with the objectivity of technical drawings.

As such, record pictures had a scientific rather than an artistic purpose, just as most photography did in its infancy. Photography’s prime value was historically regarded as its ability to make highly detailed, objective — and relatively inexpensive — records.

Industry was quick to harness the new medium to make record pictures. Significantly, one of the founders of Britain’s Photographic Society was a leading civil engineer. This original application gave rise to a genre of landscape photography that has not been properly recognized.

Spanning a period of 75 years from the mid-19th century, “Record Pictures: Photographs from the Archive of the Institution of Civil Engineers” contains previously unpublished examples of engineering projects drawn across Europe, Africa, Australasia, the Far East and Latin America.

From the railways of the deep Cofton Tunnel in London to the long, wood stave pipeline in Tasmania, the photographs in “Record Pictures” present a palimpsest of the environment, simultaneously exposing earlier histories alongside the contemporary — being refashioned through industrial development.

In his introductory essay, Michael Collins demonstrates how this fundamental approach continues unchanged, only now it is no longer industry that applies these principles but such eminent artists as Bernd & Hilla Becher and Thomas Struth, proponents of contemporary art photography.

The matter-of-fact appearance of this photographic genre is actually a mystery. The very quality that was deemed its science — as opposed to its art — today is considered the source of its wonder.

This is the quantum leap of art, where the boundaries of understanding dissolve into the realm of intuition and imagination. Far from being obsolete, the long look of record picture photography is as vital now as it ever was.

In fact, record pictures are the unacknowledged foundation of the history of photography.

Michael Collins

Michael Collins is an artist, curator and writer. His photographs have been exhibited at the Barbican Art Gallery and he has curated exhibitions of press and amateur photography. He is also the principal photography critic for “The Daily Telegraph,” an illustrated independent newspaper in London.