EMERSON, Peter Henry (1856-1936). Wild Life on a Tidal Water, London, 1890, 4to, 30 photogravure plates, folding chart, original buckram gilt (spine and corners rubbed). FIRST EDITION. NUMBER 21 OF 500 COPIES. RARE. With 3 medals awarded to Emerson. (4)

EMERSON, Peter Henry (1856-1936, photographer).  Wild Life on a Tidal Water. The Adventures of a House-Boat and her Crew ... Illustrated with Thirty Photo-Etchings by P. H. Emerson and T. F. Goodall ... Together with an Appendix "Breydon Past and Present". London: Sampson Low, Marston, Searle and Rivington, Limited, 1890. 4to (232 x 255mm). Half title, title printed in red and black, 30 fine photogravure plates by Peter Henry Emerson, including one after a painting by Thomas Frederick Goodall, folding "Plan of Breydon from Yarmouth Bridge to the Junction of the Yare at Waveney" at the end (very faint spotting and staining to text, some plates very lightly and consistently browned [or possibly printed on a different paper stock], a few plates with very light spotting and staining, but the majority unblemished, one tissue guard torn without loss). Original roan-backed pictorial blue buckram lettered in gilt, top edges gilt, others uncut, brown endpapers (spine and corners rubbed). Provenance: R. C. Fiske, Morningthorpe (ex-libris label); from the Collection of the late John Anthony Benjafield (1938-2023). FIRST EDITION of this work by the pioneer of "naturalistic photography". NUMBER 21 OF 500 COPIES OF THE "ORDINARY EDITION." RARE. Emerson believed that photography was less a mechanical process concerned with representing the world in forensic detail and more an art form, and that a photograph should reproduce as faithfully as possible what the eye actually saw, just as the Impressionists did with painting. This then radical approach did not always find favour with the photographic establishment who saw Emerson as something of a renegade. Although the wording of the title page of the present work may suggest that it was an equal collaboration between Emerson and Goodall, most of the input was Emerson's since he provided both the photogravures and the text. As the opening of his preface states, "This simple record of my impressions and experiences, whilst living with my friend, T. F. Goodall, on his house-boat on Breydon Water in Norfolk, may prove interesting to the public who have so kindly welcomed my previous productions. The plates illustrating this book were taken during this sojourn on that great tidal water in the summer of 1887. They form a series of separate chapters which will help to give the reader an idea of the wild life on Breydon and in Great Yarmouth, the old fishing town on its shore. The photo-etchings must speak for themselves; I have thought it unnecessary to write anything concerning them. The photo-etching, The Last of the Ebb, is from Goodall's large painting of Great Yarmouth from Breydon: his opus magnum during our sojourn there. It was exhibited in the Royal Academy of 1888, and will be known to some of my readers. The remaining plates are photo-etchings from photographic plates, all taken by me." Thereafter, the tone changes and displays some of the author's characteristic cantankerousness as he bemoans "... the ruinous manner in which some of my plates were printed in a previous publication." A pencil note on the front free endpaper, probably in the hand of John Benjafield, states: "This [book] rarely has its original spine and has not been rebacked. It is one of the rare copies to do so." Kahan & Colson Peter Henry Emerson (1972) pp.80-81; Newhall P. H. Emerson. The Fight for Photography as a Fine Art (1978) pp.50-53. See also Peter Turner & Richard Wood's P. H. Emerson. Photographer of Norfolk (1974) and John Taylor's The Old Order and The New. P. H. Emerson and Photography 1885-1895 (2007), the latter published to accompany the National Museum of Photography, Film and Television's exhibition of the same name. Included in the lot are 3 medals awarded to P. H. Emerson for photography: 1) [Obverse:] "'Amateur Photographer'. Prize Tour 1886. P. H. Emerson. B.A. M.B. Prize Medal" [Reverse:] "Presented by the 'Amateur Photographer'. Daguerre. Woodbury. Abney. Fox Talbot." 2) [Obverse:] "P. H. Emerson. For Instantaneous Photography" [with a view of Crystal Palace] [Reverse:] "Exposiçao Internacional de Photographia No Palacio de Crystal. Porto 1886 [with 3 allegorical figures] and 3) [Obverse:] "Amateur Photographic Exhibition. Awarded by the London Stereoscopic & Photographic Company (Limited) to P. H. Emerson M.B." [Reverse:] [3 putti in a photographic studio.] (4)