Sun Gardens

In 1840, artist-botanist Atkins and her scientist father, John Children, began to explore the new ""sun-picture'' photographic processes then being developed by William Henry Fox Talbot and Sir John Herschel. Atkins favored and applied to her scientific work one Herschel invention in particular: the cyanotype, a simple photographic process that produced photograms akin to modern blueprints. Over a 10-year period, with esthetic taste and the help of her friend Anne Dixon, she documented in this medium a major cross-section of British ferns and algae. The selection here of Atkins's prints, rarely if ever seen in this country, along with art historian Schaaf's introductory perspective and scholarly annotations, make an intriguing addition to photographic literature and throw light on an early female practitioner of the art. Foreign rights: Aperture. November