Sepia Saturday 106 : Christmas / New Year 2011

It is Open House on Sepia Saturday over Christmas and New Year : Sepia Season rather than Sepia Saturday. Just post your posts whenever you have the time and add your link to the Linky List. Post as many seasonal offerings as you want and keep calling back to check on what everyone else is posting. If you want a theme you can dissect the above 1945 image by the American photographer Nickolas Muray which is brought to you courtesy of the George Eastman House Collection on Flickr Commons.

The more normal Sepia Saturday (Sepia Saturday 107) will return on Saturday January 7th 2012. In the meantime may I take this opportunity to wish all my many Sepia Saturday friends throughout the world a wonderfully enjoyable Christmas and a peaceful and prosperous New Year.

Alan

Sepia Saturday 105 : Saturday 17 December 2011

The Festive Season is almost upon us and I thought I might give you something of a festive prompt - and this is quite some feast!. It is an illustration from the 1901 Edition of Mrs Beeton's Cookery Book (courtesy of the State Library of Queensland’s collection, courtesy of Flickr Commons). As you can see, the food on offer includes a raised game pie; pigeon pie; lamb cutlets; piped ham and boned capon. So you have a veritable cornucopia of visual prompts which should have you posting up with the stuffed larks. For Sepia Saturday 105 post your posts on or around Saturday 17th December.

The Saturday after that will be Christmas Eve and the one after that, New Years' Eve. I have therefore decided to make Sepia Saturday 106 an open seasonal call which will cover both Christmas and New Year (I will put the call post up early next week). The normal Sepia Saturday fare will return with Sepia Saturday 107 on the 7th January 2012. But all that is in the future : for now just tuck in to SS105, Bon appetit!

Sepia Saturday 104 : 10 December 2011

I won't be here for Sepia Saturday 104 (post your posts on or around Saturday 10 December 2011), but by now everyone knows how it works, so all you need me to do is to set some kind of theme for those who are theme-minded. And seeing as I will be spending a few days in Bavaria, what better choice for my archive picture this week than this delightful study of Princess Marie-Gabrielle of Bavaria and her young son Prince Luitpold. The photograph comes from the Bain Collection  of the Library of Congress and they suggest a date for the photograph of between 1910 and 1915. The latter end of this timescale is obviously wrong for the Princess died of renal failure in 1912 whilst the young Prince died in 1914 of polio. He was born in 1901 and he looks about five or six in this photograph which would date it as 1906/07. Marie-Gabrielle's husband and Luitpold's father was Crown Prince Rupprecht of Bavaria who survived the downfall of the Bavarian monarchy and two world wars, and died in 1955 aged 89. You can take whatever theme you want from the photograph or you can ignore themes all together : just enjoy yourself. While you do that I will no doubt be enjoying myself investigating the Christmas Markets (and the bierkellers) of Munich.

Sepia Saturday 103 : 3 December 2011

I am going for my winter flu jab tomorrow, visiting the nurse at the local health centre. This is in Brighouse, West Yorkshire and not Richmond, Virginia and I will be visiting the nurse rather than her driving out to visit me. But the similarities were enough to make me choose this 1961 photograph from the Adolph B. Rice Studio (part of the Library of Virginia collection on Flickr Commons) for my archive theme picture for Sepia Saturday 103 (post your posts on or around Saturday 3 December 2011). Of course, you don't have to follow the theme - whatever that might be - you can go where you want to. Just stay healthy and enjoy your Sepia Saturday.

Sepia Saturday 102 : Saturday 26 November 2011

"Honest weights, square dealings" : that's Sepia Saturday. The Old Reliable weekly Blog provides a perfect pointer to those who want to link their old images to new memories. So when you are fishing around, trying to think of what to post for Sepia Saturday 102 (on or around Saturday 26th November 2011), take a look at this week's prompt photograph : there is so much going on here that it can give rise to the most complex flights of fancy. It is a 1936 photograph (brought to you courtesy of the Library of Congress) by that great American photographer Walker Evans and it is called "Roadside Stand Near Birmingham, Alabama". You can use this as a theme or you can post off-theme : the choice is yours. Just post, link and then take a look at some of your fellow sepia posters.

Sepia Saturday 101 : Saturday 19 November 2011

First of all a big thank you to everyone who took part in Sepia Saturday 100 : it was the biggest and the best so far and the host of brilliant contributions made it a memorable occasion. It was a fine weekend of celebration and I have decided to leave the party in style in "the greatest Chevrolet in Chevrolet history". My illustration this week comes from the collection of the National Library of New Zealand and it shows the front cover of a 1930 Chevrolet sales catalogue. If you are wanting a theme for Sepia Saturday 101 (post your post on or around Saturday 19th November 2011) there are themes a-plenty in the illustration. It doesn't matter if you don't want to follow a theme : all we need from participants is an interesting old image and a few new memories. 

If themers want to give their readers a representation of the original theme image I am including a smaller version which you can include in your post if you would like to. So, here I go, jumping into my smart new car ("a six in the price range of the four") and speeding off to my next century of Sepia Saturday calls.

SEPIA SATURDAY 100 : 12 November 2011

So here we are at last : the 100th Sepia Saturday. The theme - if you need a theme - is 100 and you can interpret this as you want. It might be an image taken 100 years ago, it might be a re-post of your favorite Sepia Saturday post from the first 100, it might be an old picture of a pigeon! You might want to stray away from any hint of a theme and tell us about your Great Aunt Ruth-Annie : Sepia Saturday has always been of an anarchic frame of mind, so as long as there is an old image in there somewhere, you are welcome to the party. And let's make it a memorable party and extend an invitation to Sepia Saturday posters old and new. Spread the word so we can get as many participating as possible. Just post your post any time between now and the 12th and link it by using the list below. I have prepared a smaller version of the special Sepia Saturday 100 logo in case you want to include it in your post, feel free to download it and use it as you will. I look forward to reading all your sepia posts - and I look forward to hosting the next 100 sepia Saturdays.  Best sepia wishes to you all, from Alan

SEPIA SATURDAY is a weekly meme which encourages bloggers to publish and share old images and photographs. All that is required is for contributors to post an old image (it doesn't have to be in sepia) and provide a few words in explanation. If you could provide a link back to the Sepia Saturday Blog and visit as many of the other contributors as you can, it would also be appreciated. Each week the call for contributions incorporates an old archive image and many people like to use this as a theme for their weekly posts. You will need to use your imaginations to identify you own theme from the provided image, and you can always choose to abandon any theme and just post an image that is special to you. Once you have published your Sepia Saturday post, add a link to that post to the Linky List published each week and leave a comment to let everyone know you are joining in.