J. Craig Annan

J. Craig Annan British, b. Scotland, 1864-1946 J. Craig Annan was the son of Thomas Annan (1829-1887), one of Scotland's important early photographers who was known especially for his documentary work in Glasgow's slums. Thomas Annan was a master of the gravure process and a friend of pioneering photographer David Octavius Hill. Both father and son learned the techniques of photogravure in Vienna from its inventor, Karel Kli . Bringing the process back to Britain, they became photographers and photoengravers to Queen Victoria. Along with his brother John, also a photographer, J. Craig worked at the family's successful printing business, T. & R. Annan and Sons, for some 35 years. Inspired by impressionism, James Abbott McNeill Whistler, and Japanese prints, Annan embraced pictorialism in his own work and was one of the first to experiment with a hand-held camera. He corresponded with Alfred Stieglitz, sending examples of the work of David Octavius Hill and Robert Adamson, which led to their publication in Camera Work. He also supplied his own photogravures, as well as those of other British photographers, for inclusion in Stieglitz's magazines. A leading professional portrait photographer, Annan was also known for his outdoor figures and pastoral settings influenced by the Barbizon School. He exhibited widely, including a one-person retrospective at London's Royal Photographic Society. He was a member of the Linked Ring and first president of the International Society of Pictorial Photographers, as well as an active member of many other photographic and cultural organizations. He was made an Honorary Fellow of the Royal Photographic Society in 1924. T.W.F.