Alastair McGhee ARPS has been a member of The Society for 42 years. He explains his interest in Photography:

I am very much the third generation of photographers in my family.  I still treasure my grandfather’s mahogany tropical plate camera with brass fittings, Bausch & Lomb lens and wooden tripod.  With the advent of digital technology and scanning it still produces most interesting results. 

My earliest interest in photography was noted in 1947 when I had the use of my father’s Zeiss Baby Ikonta which shot 16 images on 120 film. A local chemist in those days processed my results on quarter plate paper.  When I joined my senior school I joined its camera club with its wet darkroom facilities and so began my introduction to club life and photographic exhibitions. By this time I had graduated to a slightly larger format using an elderly secondhand Rolleiflex Automat, or rather my father had!  I shot on Kodak Super XX and developed my results in Meritol Metal printing the results out on either Ilford Plastika or Kodak Velox Bromesco.  After Glasgow University and professional training, I married in 1960 and was very much attracted to a small house on the outskirts of the city which was advertised for sale as having a photographer’s darkroom, which we then bought as our first home.   It was not long until I joined Queens Park Camera Club where I was mentored by several notable Fellows of The Royal Photographic Society, including Willie Kerr FRPS who specialised in printing colour prints using the Agfa process.  In those days one used fairly heavily masked negatives and printed them out on Agfa unmasked CN111 paper where temperature, times and degrees of agitation were critical of achieving consistent results. Willie Kerr interested me in a larger format for exhibition work and I eventually upgraded to a second hand Linhof Technika 6x9 camera with a roll film adapter, which I still use today.

In 1969 with my family we moved south to Buckinghamshire on my accepting a business appointment in London.  It was not long before I discovered the wonders of The Society’s facilities in South Audley Street, Mayfair, of its wealth of photographic knowledge, its library, its regular monthly meetings held by its several Special Interest Groups and the opportunity to see and study the work of giants in the world of photography. Those were heady days for such a novice.  I joined The Society and the former Pictorial Group in 1970 and with guidance and encouragement of many friends, including Bill Carden FRPS, Stan Holbrook FRPS, Walter Marynowicz Hon, FRPS and Charles Todhunter FRPS I obtained my Associate membership in 1972. In 1973 I was appointed Hon. Treasurer of the Pictorial Group. Up until 2012 I have served for some thirty nine years as an Officer of one or another of the Society’s Special Interest Groups. 

This exhibition is that of a general pictorialist comprising bromide prints, C-type prints and digital images spanning recent and current work. It is also an appreciation of the advice, assistance and fellowship which I enjoyed over the years as an active member the Pictorial Group, now Visual Art Group, the Colour Group, the Archaeology & Heritage Group, the Audio Visual Group, the Digital Imaging Group and the Nature Group. 

I currently serve The Society as a trustee of The Stephen H Tyng Foundation, which acquires outstanding pictorial photographic works for The Society.

Free Entry
Monday – Friday. 9.30 – 16.30

The Royal Photographic Society
Fenton House
122 Wells Road
Bath BA2 3AH

For further information please contact Lesley Goode.  01225 325720 lesley@rps.org