Biographical / Historical note
Ken and Jenny Jacobson are photographic art dealers based in England. Ken was born in the
United States and holds a B.A. in chemistry from Princeton University and a Ph.D. in
Biophysics from King's College, London, where he met Jenny, who was working in research in
biochemistry. While pursuing his doctorate Ken became interested in and began collecting
nineteenth-century photography. This avocation became a vocation, as what was to have been a
gap year devoted to selling photographs before starting a career in scientific research,
never ended.
As his research interests shifted to the history of nineteenth century photography, Ken
began writing as well as dealing. With Jenny as his advisor and editor his books include
Étude d'après nature: 19th Century Photographs in Relation to
Art, 1996; The Lovely Sea-view-- Which All London is Now
Wondering At: A Study of the Marine Photographs Published by Gustave Le Gray,
1856-1858, 2001; Odalisques & Arabesques: Orientalist
Photography, 1839-1925, 2007; and most recently, with Jenny, Carrying off the Palaces: John Ruskin's Lost Daguerreotypes, 2015.
This most recent publication is the culmination of the Jacobson's discovery in 2006 at a
small country auction in Cumbria, England, of over 100 daguerreotypes of Italy, France and
Switzerland, including the largest extant group of daguerreotypes of Venice, as well as what
are likely the earliest photographs made of the Alps, which once belonged to English art
critic John Ruskin, and which he possibly took himself or else commissioned or purchased
from another photographer(s).
In addition to writing, Ken has delivered lectures at such institutions as the Royal
Asiatic Society, London; the Snite Museum, University of Notre Dame, Indiana; the Department
of Art History, University of Cambridge; and the J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles and at
the annual meetings of the Daguerreian Society.
The Jacobsons are members of the Association of International Photography Art Dealers, and
Ken served as one of its board members for ten years.
Sources consulted:
Behdad, Ali, Camera Orientalis: Reflections on Photography of the
Middle East, Chicago, London: The University of Chicago Press, 2016.
Jacobson, Ken, Odalisques & Arabesques: Orientalist Photography,
1839-1925, London: Quaritch, 2007.
Jacobson, Ken and Jenny Jacobson, Carrying off the Palaces: John
Ruskin's Lost Daguerreotypes, London: Quaritch, 2015.
"About Us," K. & J. Jacobson. 19th Century Photography,
http://www.jacobsonphoto.com.
|
