Took part in a presentation to overseas members today run by Janet Haines as Benelux Region Co-Organiser. Sharing knowledge is important as a community, irrespective of national boundaries. This sharing of knowledge is what membership is all about and goes right back to the origins of the RPS and indeed other photographic societies.
When visiting the Eye of the Sun exhibition in the US I took note of a section on British amateur photographers. In there I was fascinated by the work of Viscountess Jocelyn, a member of the Amateur Photographic Association from 1862 and RPS member before that. She exhibited prints, exchanged information and prints with fellow members and compiled albums. Some things have not changed over the years.
The Viscountess was a part of the retinue of Queen Victoria so her photography appears to be somewhat constrained by the social conventions of the time. As a result it features scenes of indoor domesticity as illustrated here. Indoor scenes like this must have been hard work with the materials of the time and for me this is another part of a journey studying stuff. How would I interpret this scene and how would my photography evolve under these constraints?