Original Watercolor Sketches of Germany
And 4 Early Albumen Photographs of Nuremberg and Heidelberg
A large album of original sketch and watercolors and 4 four early photographs of German scenes along the Rhine. The sketches and watercolors depict details of castles and other scenery along the Rhine in Frankfurt, Heidelberg, Munich, Vienna, Tyrol, and the like. Most of the original sketches are dated in July-August 1856.
Early Photographs
The four original photograph prints are notable as early paper photographs of Germany. The photographs are as follows:
- Large photograph of Sebalder Platz, Nuremberg, from a vantage point west of St. Sebald church, looking uphill (roughly NE) towards the castle. St. Moritz chapel, shown prominently here, was destroyed in WWII. 10 x 13 inches.
- Nuremberg street view. Shops, carriages and a few people. Shows one of the four iconic towers of the outer city wall. Likely the Laufer Torturm, seen along Äußere Laufer Gasse looking east. 8.75 x 9.5 inches.
- Architectural detail of relief decoration depicting Adam & Eve, below arched windows. Likely Nuremberg. 9 x 8 inches.
- Pair of towers at Nuremberg castle. Fünfeckiger Turm (Pentagon Tower), and the so-called Kaiserstallung and Luginsland Tower. 9 x 8 inches.
The sketches, which are very expertly drawn, are mostly identified and dated in captions, for example:
- Elaborate pictorial title page (pen & ink and watercolor wash). Mountain scene with train over arched bridge. Signed in lower left: "T.H.P. [or J.H.P.] 1857"
- Boppard. Watercolor wash sketch. The twin steeples of St. Severus. Mountains. Steamboat in the right foreground.
- Marburg. Sketch castles.
- Lahneck Castle. 1 July.
- [Stohmfels?] 1 July '56.
- Schönburg castle. From the steamboat ("von der stoomboot"). Three small sketches. 1 July 1856.
- Heidelberg. Arches and vaulted ceilings. Large watercolor. 9 3/4 x 13 1/2 inches.
- Heidelberg: Schlops Platz or castle. 5 July.
- Achensee 13 July 1856
- Tyrol Alps 1856
- Achensee.
- Tyrolu Alpen
- Tyrol 1856
- Wildbad Kreuth. 12 July
- Salzburg castle
- Tetschen Elbe
- [Esmesia? Grund]
- Wächler Grund, Schweiz 31 July
- Sketch of a tree. [Hochstein bei Hohenstein]. 31 July
- Landscape. 1 Aug.
- Forest scene. 1 Aug.
One small engraving:
- Vue de Caub, Du Pfalz, Des Ruines de Schoenberg et Gutenfels. Small engraving. 4 x 6 inches.
Albumen Prints
The four photographs are early albumen prints. The albumen print was first published in January 1847 by Louis Désiré Blanquart-Evrard. The printing method was the earliest commercially viable means of creating a photographic print on paper, using a photographic negative.
The process used albumen from egg whites to bind the photographic chemicals to the paper. Beginning in 1855, it was most popular means of photographic production and thrived until the last decade of the 19th Century.
Summary
A delightful collection of original sketches and watercolors of German scenes, greatly enhanced by the presence of four original photographs of related views.
Rarity
Such large-scale albumen photographs of Germany from the 1850s are rare in the market.