Unequivocal Magic speaks to the "quiet power" of photographs and their hidden creativity, bringing readers into the author's own journey into the history of a 1910 portrait of iconic French actress, Sarah Bernhardt. What begins as a quest to recognize the work of her once renowned photographer, Walter Barnett, becomes a story about the female performer in the West, whose use of image to innovate, protest, and survive public scrutiny can provide an enduring agency. Alex Bertram has always found old photographs intriguing, an interest augmented by her work as a picture researcher for a publisher. On a visit to the Victoria and Albert Museum in London, she saw a 1910 portrait of Sarah Bernhardt, the famous French actress whose career by then had spanned half a century. Beset with questions about this unidealized representation of the actress in her older age, she wondered what the photograph could tell us about Bernhardt, its photographer, or the circumstances surrounding the making of the portrait. Structured around the day Bernhardt had her picture taken in that London studio, Unequivocal Magic traces the travel of the portrait on its life journey, with Bertram returning again and again to this single day in 1910. Bertram's narrative likewise embraces her own creative response upon seeing the portrait for the first time, enveloping that moment into her engagement with and close examination of the lives and work of both Barnett and Bernhardt.
Alex Bertram is a writer and educator. She has worked for trade and academic publishers in Melbourne and London and holds a PhD in Creative Writing. Alex lives in Victoria, BC, and works as a writing instructor at the University of Victoria and Simon Fraser University in Vancouver.
Part 1. The Arrival of Sarah Bernhardt 1. The Studio, London, 1910 2. The Arrival of Sarah Bernhardt, London, 1910 Part 2. The Sitting 3. The Sitting, London, 1910 Part 3. The Departure of Sarah Bernhardt 4. The Collection Enters the Museums 5. The Unveiling, Canberra. 2001 Coda: The National Portrait Gallery of London, 2012
"Unequivocal Magic?is a fascinating and original exploration of an iconic photograph of French theatrical legend Sarah Bernhardt by a forgotten pioneer, Walter Barnett. Alex Bertram's impeccable research and vivid imagination liberate Bernhardt from this static image, captured by Barnett in 1910, not only providing her subject with a rich context but questioning the very meaning of photographic portraiture. Applying a phenomenological approach, Bertram uses her archival hunt?to?dissect?the meaning of Bernhardt's portrait, and the actor's relationship with her photographer and her public, while considering?the phenomenal potential of a single image to generate a universe of responses. A must-read for scholars of photography, French theatre culture in the nineteenth century, and those who appreciate the thrill of historical detective work." - Julie Wheelwright, author of?Sisters in Arms: Women Warriors from Antiquity to the New Millennium (Osprey, 2020?)
