Showing posts with label HENRI EMILIEN ROUSSEAU. Show all posts
Showing posts with label HENRI EMILIEN ROUSSEAU. Show all posts

07 Paintings by the Orientalist Artists in the Nineteenth-Century, with footnotes, #11

Orientalism is a term that is used for the depiction of aspects in Middle Eastern cultures. It refers to the works of the Western artists on Oriental subjects, produced from their travels in Western Asia, during the 19th century. Depictions of Islamic "Moors" and "Turks" can be found in Medieval, Renaissance, and Baroque art. A creative apprehension of a completely different world with its own laws, customs, special attitude towards life and death, love, feelings, and beauty. Wikipedia/Yana Naumovna Lukashevskaya

Henri Emilien Rousseau, French, 1875-1933 
Cavalier des Ouled Sidi-Cheikh/ Rider of the Ouled Sidi-Cheikh
Oil on board 
6 3/8 x 4 3/4 inches
Private collection

Sidi Sheikh Ben Abu Bekr was a holy marabout, descending in direct line from Abu Bakr , the companion of the Prophet Muhammad, the first caliph of Islam, and his descendants in their genealogy, uninterrupted, go up to Adam . It would be seen very badly, in the Algerian Sahara, if this ancient and venerable nobility were disputed.

Sidi Sheikh according to legend, was a person of exemplary piety and holiness, with the gift of performing miracles, which he passed on to his posterity and especially to the eldest of his descendants. He had an immense influence over all the populations between the border of Morocco and Jebel Amour. More on Sidi Sheikh Ben Abu Bekr

Henri Rousseau Henry, Emilien Rousseau (Cairo 1875 - Aix-en-Provence in 1933) is an Orientalist painter. A pupil of Jean-Léon Gérôme at the Beaux Arts in Paris, he won the second Grand Prix de Rome in 1900 and a travel grant at the Salon of French Artists. He traveled to Belgium, the Netherlands, North Africa, Spain and Italy where he admired the great masters (Rubens, Rembrandt, Velasquez, Murillo, the Titian, Raphael etc ...)

After this initiatory journey, he settled in Versailles and set up his studio at the Villa des Arts in Paris. In 1919 he moved to Aix in Provence with his large family (seven children). Knight of the Legion of Honour in arts. His work  is dedicated to Tunisia, Algeria and especially Morocco, Provence and the Camargue remained its anchor points. His success was with a bourgeois and wealthy clientele, where he sold his work at numerous exhibitions in Paris, Brussels, Stockholm, Marseilles. More Henri Rousseau

Anders Zorn, (1860–1920)
Kaikroddare
Oil on canvas
Private collection

Quay rowers , also known as Turkish rowers in the port of Constantinople , is a watercolor painting by Anders Zorn from 1886 that is available in four versions. The first two are owned by public institutions, the Zorn collections in Mora and the National Museum in Stockholm , while the latter two are part of private collections.

It was in Constantinople that Zorn laid the foundation for his interest in water surfaces. He was also fascinated by the slender rowing boats called kaik, its rowers and the lively shimmering city buildings that loom in the background of the picture. "I soon began to paint on the water," he writes in his memoirs, thus revealing that he was sitting in the stern of the boat, from where he was able to study the whole muscular rower's muscle game.

On the first version, the Mora version, Zorn has written "Constantinople Jan 86" in the lower right corner. The second (slightly smaller) version, which the National Museum calls a Turkish rower in the port of Constantinople , is also made in Constantinople. However, the third and possibly also the fourth are painted in Paris. The Mora version focuses on the quay rowing and the power of his movements. In the background of the image, the contours of Topkapi Palace on Seraljudden are glimpsed. In the second version, more details have been added, including an oncoming quay and a larger sailing ship in the background. The two later paintings are slightly larger and contain an image composition similar to the painting at the National Museum. The version available in the National Museumcollections were bequeathed to the museum in 1892 by Gustaf Maurits Lamm , cousin of Emma Zorn. More on this painting

Anders Leonard Zorn (18 February 1860 – 22 August 1920) was one of Sweden's foremost artists. He obtained international success as a painter, sculptor and etcher. From 1875 to 1880 Zorn studied at the Royal Swedish Academy of Arts in Stockholm. Members of Stockholm society approached him with commissions. Zorn traveled extensively to London, Paris, the Balkans, Spain, Italy and the United States, becoming an international success as one of the most acclaimed painters of his era. It was primarily his skill as a portrait painter that gained Zorn international acclaim based principally upon his incisive ability to depict the individual character of his model. At 29, he was made a Chevalier de la Légion d'honneur at the Exposition Universelle 1889 Paris World Fair. More Anders Leonard Zorn

Georges Washington, (French, 1827-1910)
The hunt 
Oil on panel
22 x 41cm (8 11/16 x 16 1/8in)
Private collection

George Washington, born 15 September 1827 in Marseille and died November 19, 1901 in Douarnenez, was a French Orientalist painter. The young Georges Washington moved to Paris, where he trained at the Ecole des Beaux Arts. The artist’s exotic style was  indebted to Eugène Delacroix. Washington’s love of the Middle East and its customs was further enhanced and encouraged by his father-in-law, the military and Orientalist painter Henri-Félix-Emmanuel Philippoteaux (1815-1884), whose daughter Anne-Léonie Philippoteaux married Washington in Paris on 6th August 1859.

Not long after finishing his training at the Ecole des Beaux Arts, Washington embarked on the first of a number of trips to Algeria and based on close observation of its inhabitants, their dress and customs in 1857 he made his Paris debut at the Salon des Artistes Français with a view of nomads titled Plaine du Hoiina (Sahara Algérien). From then up until 1901 Washington continued to be a popular exhibitor at the Salon; one of his first works shown there to gain critical acclaim was Nomades dans le Sahara en Hiver. In addition to Paris, Washington also showed his work in Moscow in 1881 and was later posthumously honoured when four of his paintings were included in the Exposition Coloniale de Marseille in 1906.

Following two commissions from a Belgian company, he travelled to Morocco and then subsequently visited Hungary, Bulgaria and Turkey, which were to inspire his varied subjects including battle scenes and cavalry skirmishes. His travels also took him to America for the unveiling in Philadelphia of a cyclorama  of the Battle of Gettysburg by his brother-in-law Paul-Dominique Philippoteaux (1846-1923).

Following the death of his wife he retired to live with his daughter and son-in-law at Douarnenez on the Brittany coast, where he died shortly after on 19th November 1901. More George Washington

Alexander M. Rossi, (British, 1840-1916)
Reflection, c. 1896
Oil on canvas
77.5 x 55.5cm (30 1/2 x 21 7/8in)
Private collection

Alexander Mark Rossi (1840 – 9 January 1916) was a successful British artist specializing in genre works who flourished in the late 19th century. He was born on the Greek Island of Corfu, the son of Dr Mark Rossi, an Italian who was one of the three judges presiding over the Ionian Islands during the time of British rule. On a visit to Preston, England in 1866, Rossi met and later married Jane Gillow. He remained in the United Kingdom thereafter. In the 1870s he moved to London.

Between 1871 and 1903, Rossi exhibited 66 works at the Royal Academy and was also a member of the Hogarth Club. Many of his paintings were of children and young adults, the models often being members of his own family. He died in Golders Green, London on 9 January 1916. More on Alexander Mark Rossi 

HOVSEP PUSHMAN, 1877 - 1966
Guardian of the Seraglio (the women's apartments (harem))
Oil on canvas
43 1/4 by 25 1/4 inches (109.8 by 64.1 cm)
Private collection

Hovsep Pushman, 1877 - 1966, a naturalized American citizen, was born in Armenia in 1877. At age 11, he held a scholarship at the Constantinople Academy of Art. By 17, he had gone to the United States and started teaching art in Chicago. He studied the culture of China, immersing himself in oriental art and perhaps philosophy. He then studied in Paris. He exhibited his work at the Salon des Artistes Francais in Paris, winning a bronze medal in 1914 and a silver medal in 1921. He also was awarded the California Art Club’s Ackerman Prize in 1918.

Pushman’s artistic identity began to take shape after he opened his own studio in 1921. Thereafter, Pushman’s career was devoted to one subject, oriental mysticism, and one form, the still life. His paintings typically featured oriental idols, pottery and glassware, all glowing duskily as if illuminated by candlelight. They were symbolic, spiritual paintings, and were sometimes accompanied by readings, which help explain their allegorical significance. 

Pushman died in 1966 in New York City. More on Hovsep Pushman

Jose Cruz Herrera, LA LINEA DE LA CONCEPTION 1890 - 1972 CASABLANCA, ÉCOLE ESPAGNOLE
YOUNG ORIENTAL LADY WITH A NECKLACE
Oil on cardboard
35 x 24,1 cm ; 13 3/4 by 9 3/8 in.
Private collection

José Cruz Herrera (1 October 1890 – 11 August 1972) was a Spanish painter who concentrated principally on genre works and landscape art. He worked in Spain, Uruguay, Argentina, France and especially Morocco, where he lived for much of his life in Casablanca.

His talent was soon apparent and he began formal training in Cádiz. He continued his studies at the School of Fine Arts in Madrid before being awarded a grant to study in Paris and Rome in 1915. He subsequently received several more awards. He concentrated on genre works and landscapes, but he is best known as an orientalist painter, with a particular faculty for producing atmospheric depictions of scenes of everyday life in Morocco.

Cruz Herrera travelled to Montevideo in Uruguay and Buenos Aires in Argentina in 1922. He went to Morocco in 1929. He subsequently established a studio at Neuilly-sur-Seine, just outside Paris, and contributed to collective exhibitions in 1934, 1935 and 1936 at the Salon de la Société Nationale des Beaux-Arts. He also exhibited solo at various times in Madrid, Barcelona and London in 1912, Antwerp in 1931, Casablanca in 1933, and Paris in 1934.

 After the end of the Spanish Civil War in 1939, he returned to Morocco. The following year Spain awarded Cruz Herrera a Knight's Cross in the Order of Isabella the Catholic, followed by a knighthood in the Civil Order of Alfonso X, the Wise in 1958. He died on 11 August 1972 in Casablanca but his remains were transferred back to La Línea to be buried there. More on José Cruz Herrera 

Alberto Pasini, (Italian, 1826-1899)
Landscape with Arab horsemen , c. 1857
Oil on canvas
66 x 41cm (26 x 16 1/8in)
Private collection

Alberto Pasini (Busseto, 3 September 1826 – Cavoretto, 15 December 1899) was an Italian painter. He was enrolled at the age of 17 years, in the Academy of Fine Art of Parma, studying landscape painting and drawing. In Parma, he was helped early on by Antonio Pasini, who painted for the local nobility and collaborated with the publishing house established by Giovanni Battista Bodoni. By 1852, he exhibited a series of thirty designs, made into lithographs, depicting various castles around Piacenza, Lunigiana and Parma. He was noticed by the artist Paolo Toschi, who encouraged Pasini to travel to Paris, where Pasini first joined the workshop of Charles and Eugène Ciceri, of the so-called School of Barbizon.

In 1853 his lithograph of The Evening gained him admittance to the Paris Salon, and to the workshop of the famous Théodore Chassériau. The eruption of the Crimean War offered a new opportunity, when in February 1855, this latter painter recommended Pasini to replace him on the entourage of the French plenipotentiary minister Nicolas Prosper Bourée to Persia. Pasini accompanied him, returning through the north of Persia and Armenia before reaching the port of Trebizond. In subsequent trips, he visited Egypt, the Red Sea, Arabia, Istanbul, and Persia. Pasini parlayed his exposures during this trip into numerous highly detailed paintings of orientalist subjects. He left again for Istanbul in October 1867, summoned by the French Ambassador Bourée. He returned to Turkey in 1876 to execute the four paintings commissioned by Sultan Abdul Aziz. He was about to return to Istanbul the next year, when his patron, the Sultan, died.

In 1865, he spent some time in Cannes, painted landscapes of the Riviera. During the Franco-Prussian War of 1870, he returned to Italy, settling in Cavoretto, on the hills around Turin. He continued to travel, closer to his home, with trips to Venice and two sojourns in Spain in 1879 and 1883. More Alberto Pasini 





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17 Orientalist Paintings by Artists from the 19th Century, with footnotes, 11

Orientalism is a term that is used for the depiction of aspects in Middle Eastern cultures. It refers to the works of the Western artists on Oriental subjects, produced from their travels in Western Asia, during the 19th century. Depictions of Islamic "Moors" and "Turks" can be found in Medieval, Renaissance, and Baroque art. A creative apprehension of a completely different world with its own laws, customs, special attitude towards life and death, love, feelings, and beauty. Wikipedia/Yana Naumovna Lukashevskaya

Etienne Dinet, 1861 - 1929, FRENCH
LE CAIRE, BRUME, POUSSIERE ET FUMEES DU SOIR
CAIRO, MIST, DUST AND EVENING FUMES
signed E DINET lower left
oil on board
37 by 75cm., 14½ by 29½in
Private Collection

Nasreddine Dinet (born as Alphonse-Étienne Dinet on 28 March 1861 – 24 December 1929, Paris) was a French orientalist painter. Dinet was born the son of a prominent French judge. From 1871, he studied at the Lycée Henry IV, where the future president Alexandre Millerand was also among the students. Upon graduation in 1881 he enrolled in the École nationale supérieure des Beaux-Arts and entered the studio of Victor Galland. The following year he studied under William Bouguereau and Tony Robert-Fleury at the Académie Julian. He also exhibited for the first time at the Salon des artistes français.

Nasreddine Dinet (1861–1929)
Raoucha, c. 1901
Oil on canvas
46 × 45 cm (18.1 × 17.7 in)
Private collection

Dinet made his first trip to Bou Saâda by the Ouled Naïl Range in southern Algeria in 1884, with a team of entomologists. The following year he made a second trip on a government scholarship, this time to Laghouat. At that time he painted his first two Algerian pictures: les Terrasses de Laghouat and l’Oued M’Sila après l’orage.

Alphonse Etienne Dinet (French, 1861-1929)
L'Arabe et son cheval , c. 1903
Oil on canvas
50.8 x 40.64cm (20 x 16in).
Private Collection

With his painting, L'Arabe et son cheval, Dinet's talent for capturing psychology and detail is evident, from the prayer beads around the neck of the rider swathed in white cloth, to the horse's colorful bridle, and background of soft desert mountains. It is one of the only paintings by the artist where the individual appears to be posing, with the rider's steely, direct stare towards the viewer, as Dinet's preferred work state was somewhat spontaneous with the reliance on his camera to capture more permanent scenes. L'Arabe also represents a distinct departure from Dinet's usual cast of playful Berber adolescents and groups of women, illustrating instead a common trio found in Orientalist works of art: a man, his horse and the desert they travel together. The unique curved shape of the top of the canvas is reminiscent of the arched dome commonly found in Middle Eastern architecture, especially the circular construction of mosques. With the maturation of his talent, Dinet became an arch-realist and an authority on Algerian life rather than an exotic maker of myth. More L'Arabe et son cheva

He won the silver medal for painting at the Exposition Universelle in 1889, and in the same year founded the Société Nationale des Beaux-Arts. In 1887 he further founded with Léonce Bénédite, director of the Musée du Luxembourg, the Société des Peintres Orientalistes Français.

Nasreddine Dinet (1861–1929)
On the Terrace in the Moonlight, c. 1908
(Sur les Terrasses, Clair de Lune)
Oil on canvas
51x61cm, 20x24"
Private Collection

In 1903 he bought a house in Bou Saâda and spent three quarters of each year there. He announced his conversion to Islam in a private letter of 1908, and completed his formal conversion in 1913, upon which he changed his name to Nasr’Eddine Dinet. In 1929 he and his wife undertook the Hajj to Mecca. The respect he earned from the natives of Algeria was reflected by the 5,000 who attended his funeral on 12 January 1930 in Bou Saâda. There he was eulogized by the former Governor General of Algeria Maurice Viollette. More Alphonse-Étienne Dinet

Etienne Dinet, 1861 - 1929, FRENCH
SPECTATEURS ADMIRANT UNE DANSEUSE, c. 1905
SPECTATORS ADMIRING A DANCER
Oil on canvas
84 by 102.5cm., 33 by 40¼in.
Private Collection

Spectateurs admirant une danseuse is a superb example of Dinet's mature oeuvre, testament to his intimate knowledge of, and respect for, the people of Algeria. Fluid, almost Impressionistic brushstrokes, and beautifully confident handling of light as it filters through from behind the figures, are coupled with a sympathetic, careful observation of the men’s various expressions as they react to the dance unfolding before them. More Spectateurs admirant une danseuse

Eugène Fromentin, 1820 - 1876, FRENCH
LE SIMOUN
Oil on canvas
55 by 65.5cm., 21¾ by 25¾in.
Private Collection

The simoun is a warm, dry and violent wind that blows on the eastern shores of the Mediterranean Sea: the Sahara , in Palestine , in Syria and in the desert of Arabia.

Le Simoun is among the most iconic images in nineteenth-century Orientalist art, one of a handful of smaller versions of Fromentin's extraordinary painting of 1864, the Coup de vent dans les plaines d'alfa  Below

Eugène Fromentin, 1820 - 1876, FRENCH
Coup de vent dans les plaines d'alfa, c. 1864
Gale in the Alfa Plains
Oil on canvas
117 by 163cm
Najd Collection of orientalist paintings

Eugène Fromentin (October 24, 1820 – August 27, 1876) was a French painter and writer, now better remembered for his writings. He was born in La Rochelle. After leaving school he studied for some years under Louis Cabat, the landscape painter. Fromentin was one of the earliest pictorial interpreters of Algeria, having been able, while quite young, to visit the land and people that suggested the subjects of most of his works, and to store his memory as well as his portfolio with the picturesque and characteristic details of North African life. In 1849, he was awarded a medal of the second class.

In 1852, he paid a second visit to Algeria, accompanying an archaeological mission, and then completed that minute study of the scenery of the country and of the habits of its people which enabled him to give to his after-work the realistic accuracy that comes from intimate knowledge. More

Alfred Dehodencq, 1822 - 1882, FRENCH
LE HAJJ
Oil on canvas
85.5 by 120cm., 33¾ by 47¼in.
Private Collection

Dehodencq's large and lavish rendition of the annual Hajj (pilgrimage) en route to Mecca is an especially magnificent and wonderfully detailed painting of the subject by a Western artist. The landscape is not specific, but the shoreline might suggest a location on the Red Sea, south of Aqaba. At the centre of the enfilade of dignitaries, janissaries, soldiers, and musicians and mounted on the leading camel is the holy mahmal, the elaborate coffer containing the Koran that accompanies the pilgrims to Mecca.

Ottoman control of the Hajj developed with the rise of the Ottoman Empire. The sacking of Constantinople in 1453 established the Ottomans as the principle Muslim power worldwide and their later conquest of Egypt and Syria in 1515 and 1517 gave them control of the eastern border of the Red Sea including Mecca and Medina. With the Sultan's adoption of the role of protector of the two shrines at Mecca and Medina the pre-eminent status of the Ottoman Sultan among Muslim rulers was confirmed. In the ensuing years the Ottomans did their utmost to be seen as leaders of the Muslim world and defenders of Islam's holiest cities, a role that included building forts and defences to upgrade the Hajj routes, the three most important of which led from Cairo, Damascus and Baghdad. More

Edmé-Alexis-Alfred Dehodencq, PARIS 1822-1882, OUTPUT PACHA 
LA SORTIE DU PACHA
THE PACHA GOING OUT; SIGNED LOWER RIGHT; OIL ON CANVAS
Oil on canvas 
118 x 89 cm; 46 1/2 by 35 in

Alfred Dehodencq (23 April 1822 – 2 January 1882) was a mid-19th-century French Orientalist painter born in Paris. He was known for his vivid oil paintings, especially of Andalusian and North African scenes. Dehodencq was born in Paris. During his early years, he studied at the Ecole des Beaux Arts. During the French Revolution of 1848 he was wounded in the arm and was sent to convalesce in the Pyrenees before moving to Madrid. He spent five years in Spain where he became acquainted with the works of Spanish painters Diego Velázquez and Francisco Goya which had a strong influence on his approach to painting.

In 1853 he travelled to Morocco, where for the following ten years he produced many of his most famous paintings depicting scenes of the world he encountered. Dehodencq was the first foreign artist known to have lived in Morocco for an extended number of years.

Dehodencq married Maria Amelia Calderon in 1857 in Cadiz, Spain, and they had three children. Dehodencq returned to Paris in 1863 with his wife, and was decorated with the Legion of Honour in 1870. He committed suicide on 2 January 1882 having been sick for a long time and is buried in the Montmartre Cemetery. More Alfred Dehodencq 

Henry James Soulen, (American, 1888-1965)
Hajj camp, en route to the Masjid al-Haram
Oil on canvas 
76.2 x 91.4 cm (30 x 36 in)
Private Collection

HENRY JAMES SOULEN (1888 - 1965), was born in Milwaukee, Henry James Soulen was a noted illustrator. He attended the Art Students League in Milwaukee, the Art Institute of Chicago, and later studied under the celebrated teacher, Howard Pyle, the founder of the Brandywine School. He also studied with N.C. Wyeth, Frank Schoonover, and Jessie Wilcox Smith.

An illustrator for the "Saturday Evening Post," Henry Soulen began his career in May, 1912. He also worked for other publications including "Country Gentleman" and "Ladies Home Journal" and earned a Peabody Award for his magazine cover designs. He was known for his use of intense, brilliant color at a time when many illustrations were in black and white. 

He was a thorough researcher and eventually collected a large and varied collection of costumes, weapons, and other objects that he used in his drawings. At age 62, he became a college professor at the University of Maryland and taught the first illustration that art department offered. During World War II, he gave free art lessons at the Valley Forge Military Hospital, a rehabilitation center for veterans. More Henry James Soulen

Henry James Soulen (American, 1888-1965)
A pilgrimage to Palestine, Sinai
Oil on canvas
86.4 x 76.2cm (34 x 30in) 
Private Collection

Soulen spent several months traveling through the Middle East as the accompanying artist to Dr. Harry Emerson Frosdick who wrote A Pilgrimage to Palestine for the Christmas issue of The Ladies Home Journal. It was during that trip that Soulen painted the present work, A pilgrimage to Palestine, Sinai and fragments of his letter that accompanied sketches sent while overseas were quoted in Frosdick's article: 

"A number of persons told me, before I left America, that I would be disappointed by the artistic possibilities of Palestine. They agreed that it was burned up and uninteresting. I am quite sure now they hadn't seen much of the real country. In the cities, including Jerusalem, familiarity with tourists has made the natives more or less uninteresting. But, in the villages and in the wilderness, conditions are as they were thousands of years ago. You will see acres of wheat in the fertile valleys to be reaped with a sickle. The costumes are the same...It is only because we judge Bible stories by our own standards that any of them sound improbable. After my experience of living in the desert, I have begun to understand these stories." More A pilgrimage to Palestine

Henri Emilien Rousseau,  (French, 1875-1933)
Return of the falconer 
Oil on canvas
50.8 x 43.18cm (20 x 17in).
Private Collection

Return of the falconer. Passionate about portraying the reality rather than the romance of Bedouin life, Rousseau spent the years between 1920 and 1932 in intense study of nomadic culture and visiting the Rif and Atlas mountains of Morocco. By befriending Caïds, or tribal chiefs, Rousseau was granted access to various regions which were otherwise off limits to outsiders, and gained a unique perspective to his work distinct from that of his more imaginative peers. Perhaps it was here where he fell under the spell of the Bedouin horsemen, a subject Rousseau was already familiar with, and would come to characterize his Orientalist compositions. In 1927, the Galerie Georges Petit in Paris saw the exhibition of more than eighty Moroccan works by Rousseau which was met with enormous success. This was followed by an exhibition at the Exposition Universelle, held in 1931.

In this present work, The return of the falconer, Rousseau illustrates a favorite subject of his, the horseman and his hunting bird, which he returned to again and again. More noble than fanciful, the villagers become figures of truth set against the indigenous desert landscape Rousseau was unwilling to romanticize, whether his subjects were quietly reflective, as in this work, or bearing a standard. Yet try as he might to subdue the exotic, there is no escaping the majesty and appeal of falconry in Rousseau's art. More Return of the falconer 

Henri Rousseau Henry, Emilien Rousseau (Cairo 1875 - Aix-en-Provence in 1933) is an Orientalist painter. A pupil of Jean-Léon Gérôme at the Beaux Arts in Paris, he won the second Grand Prix de Rome in 1900 and a travel grant at the Salon of French Artists. He traveled to Belgium, the Netherlands, North Africa, Spain and Italy where he admired the great masters (Rubens, Rembrandt, Velasquez, Murillo, the Titian, Raphael etc ...)

After this initiatory journey, he settled in Versailles and set up his studio at the Villa des Arts in Paris. In 1919 he moved to Aix in Provence with his large family (seven children). Knight of the Legion of Honour in arts. His work  is dedicated to Tunisia, Algeria and especially Morocco, Provence and the Camargue remained its anchor points. His success was with a bourgeois and wealthy clientele, where he sold his work at numerous exhibitions in Paris, Brussels, Stockholm, Marseilles. More

Leopold Alphons Mielich, (Austrian, 1863-1929)
The house of Cairo 
oil on canvas
76.45 x 51.56cm (30 1/8 x 20 5/16in).
Private Collection

Alphons Leopold Mielich (Klosterneuburg, 27 January 1863 - Salzburg, 25 January 1929) was an Austrian orientalist painter. In 1902, he traveled with the Czech scholar Alois Musil to the Umayyad desert castle Qasr Amra, then in the Ottoman Empire (modern-day Jordan), where he copied some of the paintings discovered there. More Alphons Leopold Mielich

Alphons Leopold Mielich, 1863-1929, AUSTRIAN
THE POTTERY SELLER
Oil on canvas
145.5 by 195.5 cm
Private Collection

The Pottery Seller by Alphons Mielich is a masterful evocation of everyday Egyptian life. As startling as the all the bustling activity of market day is the bright desert light, which so fascinated Western painters on their visits to the region, and which lent their palettes a whole new chromatic dimension. The heat of the midday sun is almost palpable, as one trader, engaged in conversation with another, shields his face using the basket containing his wares. Austrian-born Mielich first travelled to Egypt in 1889, and returned on several occasions up until the outbreak of the First World War, and the 'snapshot' verisimilitude of the scene in the present work is testimony to his sensitive understanding of the culture he depicts.  More The Pottery Seller

Alberto Pasini, 1826 - 1899, ITALIAN
A FERRY ON THE NILE, c. 1861
Oil on canvas
39 by 65cm., 15½ by 25½in.
Private Collection

Alberto Pasini (Busseto, 3 September 1826 – Cavoretto, 15 December 1899) was an Italian painter. He was enrolled at the age of 17 years, in the Academy of Fine Art of Parma, studying landscape painting and drawing. In Parma, he was helped early on by Antonio Pasini, who painted for the local nobility and collaborated with the publishing house established by Giovanni Battista Bodoni. By 1852, he exhibited a series of thirty designs, made into lithographs, depicting various castles around Piacenza, Lunigiana and Parma. He was noticed by the artist Paolo Toschi, who encouraged Pasini to travel to Paris, where Pasini first joined the workshop of Charles and Eugène Ciceri, of the so-called School of Barbizon.

Alberto Pasini, 1826 - 1899, ITALIAN
Damascus, c. 1880
Oil on fabric
Height: 42.6 cm (16.8 in). Width: 32.6 cm (12.8 in). ;
Walters Art Museum, Mount Vernon-Belvedere, Baltimore, Maryland

In 1853 his lithograph of The Evening gained him admittance to the Paris Salon, and to the workshop of the famous Théodore Chassériau. The eruption of the Crimean War offered a new opportunity, when in February 1855, this latter painter recommended Pasini to replace him on the entourage of the French plenipotentiary minister Nicolas Prosper Bourée to Persia. Pasini accompanied him, returning through the north of Persia and Armenia before reaching the port of Trebizond. In subsequent trips, he visited Egypt, the Red Sea, Arabia, Istanbul, and Persia. Pasini parlayed his exposures during this trip into numerous highly detailed paintings of orientalist subjects. He left again for Istanbul in October 1867, summoned by the French Ambassador Bourée. He returned to Turkey in 1876 to execute the four paintings commissioned by Sultan Abdul Aziz. He was about to return to Istanbul the next year, when his patron, the Sultan, died.

In 1865, he spent some time in Cannes, painted landscapes of the Riviera. During the Franco-Prussian War of 1870, he returned to Italy, settling in Cavoretto, on the hills around Turin. He continued to travel, closer to his home, with trips to Venice and two sojourns in Spain in 1879 and 1883. More Alberto Pasini 

Alberto Pasini, 1826 - 1899, ITALIAN
Arab Caravan, before 1899
Oil on Canvas






Acknowledgement: Sotheby's, Bonhams

Images are copyright of their respective owners, assignees or others


29 Magical Doorways That Connect Two Locations, Dimensions, or Points in Time, with footnotes

Max Baur
Kloster Chorin and Lehnin, 1930s-40's
Photograph
23 x 16 cm
Private collection

Lehnin Abbey (German: Kloster Lehnin) is a former Cistercian monastery in Lehnin in Brandenburg, Germany. Founded in 1180 and secularized during the Protestant Reformation in 1542, it has accommodated the Luise-Henrietten-Stift, a Protestant deaconesses' house since 1911. The foundation of the monastery in the newly established Margraviate of Brandenburg was an important step in the high medieval German Ostsiedlung; today the extended Romanesque and Gothic brickstone buildings, largely restored in the 1870s, are a significant part of Brandenburg's cultural heritage. More on Lehnin Abbey

Born in Gunzburg an der Donau in 1898, Max Baur was instantly captivated by the natural landscapes of his local surroundings - in particular the land around the Sanssouci Palace in Potsdam.

Baur’s first monograph was published in 1937, and after moving his family to the south of Germany in an effort to escape the worst of the war, he opened an ‘atelier of photography’ in 1953. From this point his work grew more expansive, as he began to document German cities and buildings with the same serene eye he applied to his natural landscapes. 

Baur was reproachful of the label ‘photographer,’ preferring instead to describe himself as a ‘painter of light.’ Taking just the briefest look at his work, as petals dance brightly off the surface and trees develop a crisply shadowed frame, it is not difficult to see why. More on Max Baur

Bourne, Samuel
High Gate of Fatehpur Sikri, Agra, c. 1866
Photograph
H. 23.3 cm, W. 28.1 cm
Victoria and Albert Museum

From 1863-1870, Bourne made three trips to the Himalayas in Northern India. Many of these topographical photographs appear as a result of this final, six month photographic expedition in 1866

Buland Darwaza, or the "Gate of Magnificence", was built in 1576 A.D. by Akbar,  Mughal Emperor from 1556 until his death, to commemorate his victory over Gujarat. It is the main entrance to the palace at Fatehpur Sikri, a town which is 43 km from Agra, India.

Buland Darwaza is the highest gateway in the world and is an example of Mughal architecture. It displays Akbar's empire. More on Buland Darwaza

Samuel Bourne (1834-1912) left his job as a bank clerk in Nottingham to become a professional photographer, and in 1863 sailed to India to develop his new career. He remained there for several years to become recognised as one of the most successful British photographers to document the expanding British empire. His photographs were produced primarily for the European market, and provided a glimpse of India as a distant colonised land and its people. Bourne's photographic success was a combination of his impressive photographic skill and ability to present photographs of India that co-incided with the western, Orientalist vision of the exotic East. In 1870 Bourne took up permanent residency in England and withdrew from photography after establishing a cotton-doubling mill. In 1896 after retiring from business he devoted his time to watercolour painting. More on Samuel Bourne

Felice Beato (British, 1825–d. ca. 1908)
Lahore Gate of the Royal Palace, Delhi , c. 1858
Albumen print
26 x 31.5 cm. (10.2 x 12.4 in.)
Victoria and Albert Museum

Beato had a particular interest in photographing military campaigns. The rich diversity of his work in India developed after his arrival in February 1858, where he photographed the aftermath of the Indian Mutiny of 1857 and devastation in Delhi, Cawnpore and Lucknow, famous for its massacre of Europeans by the Indian army. Beato's war photographs of India range from portraits of commanding officers to vast landscapes and derelict forts and palaces. More on this work

The Lahori Gate is the main entrance to the Red Fort in Delhi. The Red Fort was the residence of the Mughal emperor of India for nearly 200 years, until 1857. It is located in the centre of Delhi. In addition to accommodating the emperors and their households, it was the ceremonial and political centre of Mughal government and the setting for events critically impacting the region.

Constructed in 1648 by the fifth Mughal Emperor Shah Jahan as the palace of his fortified capital Shahjahanabad, the Red Fort is named for its massive enclosing walls of red sandstone and is adjacent to the older Salimgarh Fort, built by Islam Shah Suri in 1546. The imperial apartments consist of a row of pavilions, connected by a water channel known as the Stream of Paradise (Nahr-i-Behisht). The fort complex is considered to represent the zenith of Mughal creativity under Shah Jahan and although the palace was planned according to Islamic prototypes, each pavilion contains architectural elements typical of Mughal buildings that reflect a fusion of Timurid and Persian traditions. More on The Lahori Gate

There is little conclusive evidence about the life of the 19th century photographer Felice A. Beato, who was born in Venice between 1825 and 1830, but became a naturalised British subject. Beato is most recognised as a war photographer where his travel from Europe provided the opportunity to record military war in India after the Mutiny of 1857, the opium wars in China in 1860 and Japan in 1862. Beato later died in Burma, ca 1908-1909. More on Felice Beato

Georg Friedrich Schmidt
Nuremberg: Choir of St. Lorenz; St. Lorenz West portal, c. 1850
Albumen prints, Photography
Private collection

St. Lorenz (St. Lawrence) is a medieval church of the former free imperial city of Nuremberg in southern Germany. It is dedicated to Saint Lawrence. The church was badly damaged during the Second World War and later restored. It is one of the most prominent churches of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Bavaria.

The nave of the church was completed by around 1400. In 1439, work began on the choir in the form of a hall church in the late German sondergotik style of gothic architecture. The choir was largely completed by 1477 by Konrad Roriczer, although Jakob Grimm completed the intricate vaults.

In the choir one can find the carving of the Angelic Salutation by Veit Stoss, and the monumental tabernacle by Adam Kraft. The latter is notable for including a prominent figure of the sculptor himself.

The west facade is articulated richly reflecting the wealth of the Nuremberg citizens. The facade is dominated by the two towers, mirroring St. Sebald and indirectly Bamberg Cathedral with a sharp towering West portal doorway, and a well-indented rose window 9 metres in diameter. More on St. Lorenz

Georg Friedrich Schmidt (24 January 1712 Schönerlinde - 25 January 1775 Berlin) was a German engraver, etcher and pastel painter, in the Rococo style.

When he was fourteen, he was allowed to take lessons at the Prussian Academy of Arts. On the advice of his teachers, an apprenticeship for him was obtained with the engraver, Georg Paul Busch 

In 1736 he left Berlin and headed to Paris.

Nicolas IV de Larmessin, "Engraver to the King", took him into his workshop, where he completed a seven-month training course; engraving portraits for art dealers and providing some illustrations for the publisher, Michel Odieuvre [fr]. In 1740 he became self-employed. The following year he accepted an offer to become a court engraver back in Berlin. He returned there in the middle of the Second Silesian War, and his first major assignment was creating tactical maps of the battles of Kesselsdorf and Soor.

Much of his work involved illustrating King Frederick's writings, although he also produced portraits and copies of the works of Rembrandt. Following the outbreak of the Seven Years' War, the demand for art decreased dramatically, and tensions rose at the court. As did many of his colleagues, he accepted an invitation from Empress Elizabeth of Russia and went to St. Petersburg on leave. He would spend five years there. 

Having established his reputation throughout Europe, he soon became a wealthy man and was able to acquire a collection of original etchings by Rembrandt. He did, however, continue to give lessons at the Prussian Academy. Over the years, his style fell out of fashion, and he found himself slowly being overshadowed by younger engravers who were willing to work for less. Georg died in 1775, aged sixty-three. More on Georg Friedrich Schmidt

Henri Emilien Rousseau - French (1875-1933) 
"The Entrance" 
Oil on canvas
18 x 21 1/2
Private collection

The French artist Henri Rousseau (1844-1910) was a self-taught painter who became a friend of Picasso and an inspiration to the Paris avant-garde. Born on May 21, 1844, in Laval, France. While working as a toll collector in Paris, he taught himself to paint and exhibited his work almost annually from 1886 until the end of his life. He was given the nickname "Le Douanier" ("the customs officer") by his acquaintances in the Parisian avant-garde. Despite his connections with other artists and dealers, he never profited from his paintings; however, works like "The Dream," "The Sleeping Gypsy" and "Carnival Evening" influenced many artists who came after him. He died in Paris on September 2, 1910. More on Henri Rousseau

Catherine M. Wood (British, ?-1939) The North Door, Ely Cathedral
Catherine M. Wood (British, 1857-1939)
The North Door, Ely Cathedral 
Oil on canvas
40.7 x 30.5cm (16 x 12in)
Private collection

Ely Cathedral, the Cathedral Church of the Holy and Undivided Trinity of Ely, is the principal church of the Diocese of Ely, in Cambridgeshire, England, and is the seat of the Bishop of Ely and a suffragan bishop, the Bishop of Huntingdon. 

Ely Abbey was founded in 672, by the daughter (St Etheldreda) of the East Anglian King Anna. In later centuries the depredations of Viking raids may have resulted in its destruction. It is possible that some monks provided a continuity through to its refoundation in 970, under a Benedictine rule. The presence of her relics, bolstered by the growing body of literature on her life and miracles, was a major driving force in the success of the refounded abbey, and was progressively demolished from 1102 alongside the construction of the Norman church.

The North Door. This twelfth-century carved door way connected the Cathedral to the medieval cloister. The central carving, which is believed to date from 1135, shows Christ enthroned in majesty. His right hand is raised in blessing, and his left hand holds the Book with the Seven Seals. Around the doorway some of the carvings depict the signs of the Zodiac, a reminder that this was the gate of heaven. The almond-shaped frame around Jesus, known as a 'mandorla', symbolises new life the hope held out to all who pass through this door. 

Catherine Morris Wood was born in Islington in 1857.  In 1879 she won a scholarship to the Royal Female School of Art. She was talented and prolific, exhibiting at the Royal Academy from 1880, when she was 23, and continuing to show her work there for more than forty years. She  was elected a member of the Society of Women Artists (until 1872, the Society of Lady Artists, the Royal Institute of Painters in Oils and the RBA, Suffolk Street.

In 1892, at the age of 35, Catherine married the watercolourist Richard Henry Wright of Hampshire, who painted primarily architectural and landscape subjects. Catherine specialized in still life and genre subjects, but as well as the approved subjects for Victorian female painters.

Her husband died in 1930, and Catherine herself may have followed him in 1939, after which she can no longer be traced.

Francis BEDFORD  English 1816–94  
Tintern Abbey (1860s)
  From the No title (Stephen Thompson album) (1859– c. 1868)  albumen silver photograph  20.1 x 15.3 cm 

Tintern Abbey was founded by Walter de Clare, Lord of Chepstow, on 9 May 1131. It is situated in the village of Tintern in Monmouthshire, on the Welsh bank of the River Wye which forms the border between Monmouthshire in Wales and Gloucestershire in England. It was the first in Wales. Its ruins inspired William Wordsworth's poem "Lines written a few miles above Tintern Abbey", Alfred, Lord Tennyson's poem "Tears, Idle Tears", Allen Ginsberg's "Wales Visitation", and more than one painting by J. M. W. Turner. 
The present-day remains of Tintern are a mixture of building works covering a 400-year period between 1136 and 1536. Very little remains of the first buildings; a few sections of walling are incorporated into later buildings and the two recessed cupboards for books on the east of the cloisters are from this period. The church of that time was smaller than the present building and was slightly to the north. More on Tintern Abbey

Francis Bedford (1816 in London – 15 May 1894) was an English photographer. The son of the successful church architect Francis Octavius Bedford, he began his career as an architectural draughtsman and lithographer, before taking up photography in the early 1850s.

He helped to found the Royal Photographic Society in 1853. In 1854, at Marlborough House Queen Victoria commissioned him to photograph objects in the royal collection. More on Francis Bedford


Charles Clifford (British, 1821–1863)
Tipos Locales, c. 1858
Albumen silver print from glass negative
11 5/16 x 15 1/2 in. (28.8 x 39.4 cm)
The Elisha Whittelsey Collection

Although British by birth, Charles Clifford was the greatest photographer working in Spain in the mid-nineteenth century and was official photographer to both Queen Victoria and Queen Isabella II. This party from Lagartera, a town in central Spain famous for embroidery and lace, posed in their local finery in the nearby castle of Oropesa. Although Clifford is best known for his documentation of Spanish architectural monuments, he clearly possessed a talent for portraiture. In this grouping, he posed each member individually, taking care to display their costumes to best advantage. Particularly striking is the dashing younger man at the edge of the group, whose rakish presence is enhanced by his loosely draped black cloak and the shadow of his stylish wide-brimmed hat. More on Charles Clifford

Charles Clifford - 1819 - 1863 
Granada, La Alhambra, puerta en la Sala, de Justicia, c. 1858 
Papel albuminado, vintage print
43,2 x 30 cm
Private collection

Of the four exterior doors to the walls of the Alhambra, the most monumental is the Gate of Justice, built in 1348, also known as the Gate of the Esplanade (Puerta de la Explanada) because of the large esplanade that extended before it. Its magnificent silhouette stands out, making it one of the symbols of the Alhambra. 

Charles Clifford - 1819 - 1863 
Granada, La Alhambra, Torre del Vino, c. 1858 
Papel albuminado
36 x 25,5 cm
Private collection

The Wine Gate (Puerta del Vino) is supposed to be one of the oldest constructions of the Alhambra, it could date from the period of Mohammed II. Today it is isolated within the Square of the Cisterns (Plaza de los Aljibes) although it was possibly part of a group of constructions that enclosed this square.

Charles Clifford - 1819 - 1863 
Granada, Torre del Vino, fachada interior, c. 1858 
Papel albuminado
42,4 x 33,5 cm
Private collection


Since 1556, the neighbours of the Alhambra left at this gate the wine that they drunk and which was not submitted to taxation. This is a possible explanation for the gate's name, although there is another theory, according to which the name is the result of a mistake. Apparently two words got muddled up: «Bib al-hamra'», meaning Red Gate or Gate to the Alhambra, which would be the original name of the gate, and «Bib al-jamra», meaning Wine Gate. This second theory would then prove that this was the access gate to the higher Alhambra. More on The Wine Gate

Charles Clifford - 1819 - 1863 
Granada, Torre del Vino, entrada interior, c. 1858 
Papel albuminado
41,2 x 27,8 cm
Private collection

Charles Clifford - 1819 - 1863 
Granada, Patio de Alberca, c. 1858 
Papel albuminado
31 x 40,5 cm
Private collection

The Court of the Myrtles (Patio de los Arrayanes) has received different names throughout time. Its current name is due to the myrtle bushes that surround the central pond and the bright green colour of which contrasts with the white marble of the patio. It was also called the Patio of the Pond or the Reservoir (Patio del Estanque o de la Alberca) because of the central pond, which is 34 metres long and 7,10 meters wide. 

The Court of the Myrtles (Patio de los Arrayanes) is part of the palace and fortress complex of the Alhambra. Its current name is due to the myrtle bushes that surround the central pond and the bright green colour of which contrasts with the white marble of the patio. It was also called the Patio of the Pond or the Reservoir (Patio del Estanque o de la Alberca) because of the central pond, which is 34 metres long and 7,10 meters wide. The patio is divided in two sides by the pond, which receives its water from two fountains. The space has chambers and porticoes around it. These porticoes rest on columns with cubic capitals, which have seven semicircular arches decorated with fretwork rhombuses and inscriptions praising God. The central arch is greater than the other six and has solid scallops decorated with stylised vegetal forms and capitals of mocarabes.

Alhambra ( "the red one"), the complete form of which was Calat Alhamra, is a palace and fortress complex located in Granada, Andalusia, Spain. It was originally constructed as a small fortress in 889 and then largely ignored until its ruins were renovated and rebuilt in the mid-13th century by the Moorish emir Mohammed ben Al-Ahmar of the Emirate of Granada, who built its current palace and walls. It was converted into a royal palace in 1333 by Yusuf I, Sultan of Granada. More on The Court of the Myrtles

Charles Clifford - 1819 - 1863 
Granada, (Patio de los Leones) detalle, c. 1858 
Papel albuminado
33, 7 x 43, 2 cm
Private collection

The Patio of the Lions (Patio de los Leones) is probably the most famous place of the Alhambra. It is so called because of the twelve lions that throw jets of water and which are part of the fountain in the middle of the patio. This patio was built by order of Mohammed V. More on The Patio of the Lions

Charles Clifford - 1819 - 1863 
Granada, La Alhambra, 
Patio de los Leones, c. 1862 
Papel albuminado
42 x 31,5 cm
The Court of the Myrtles

The twelve lions that throw jets of water and which are part of the fountain in the middle of the patio.

Starting in the second half of the 19th century, a series of highly relevant transformations took place on the roofs of the galleries and pavilions of the Patio de los Leones in the Alhambra. During the course of six decades, and in a concatenated manner over time, certain aesthetic changes took place in these skirts and their eaves system that have partly survived to the present, constituting the current image of these roofs. The authors of these changes in the essence of these elements, popularly known from numerous photographs and texts of the time, sought to align themselves with the historicist romantic tendencies, but they erroneously reinterpreted Nasrid architecture, temporarily producing a series of alterations in all these structures that did not they had been thoroughly analyzed up to now. More on this work

Charles Clifford - 1819 - 1863 
Sevilla, Alcázar Real, 
patio principal, c.1858 
Papel albuminado
34,2 x 43 cm
Private collection

The Real Alcázar is a complex of palaces surrounded by a wall, located in the city of Seville . Construction began in the early Middle Ages . It's architecture has evolved throughout history; from the Islamic, its first inhabitants, the Moorish and Gothic of the post-conquest of the city by the Castilian troops period. Successive reforms have added items Renaissance and Baroque. More on More on this work

Charles Clifford (British, b. ca. 1819–1863)
Detail of the entrance to the Alcázar, before 1861
Albumen print
34.2 x 43 cm. (13.5 x 16.9 in.)
Private collection

Charles Clifford (British, b. ca. 1819–1863)
Sevilla, 132 (Alcázar) , detail of the south angle, c.1858
Albumen print
41.4 x 30.9 cm. (16.3 x 12.2 in.)
Private collection

Charles Clifford - 1819 - 1863 
Jerez, Puerta de San Miguel,1862 
Papel albuminado
43 x 32,2 cm
Private collection

The oldest of the church's façades, the so-called Saint Joseph façade, was built in 1480 in a style very much inspired by the Flemish. The main façade is a robust Baroque tower, the upper part of which supports a spire covered with «azulejos». More on this work

Charles Clifford - 1819 - 1863 
Jerez, 
Puerta de Santiago, 1862 
Papel albuminado
41 x 32 cm
Private collection

Near Santiago square, the church is built outside the enclosure walled of the medieval city. In the place where there was a chapel with the same name was built in times of the Spanish reconquest. 

Charles Clifford - 1819 - 1863 
Murcia, Fachada principal de la Catedral, 1862 
Papel albuminado
41,8 x 33 cm
Private collection

When the Christian king Jaime I the Conqueror conquered the city, in spite of the existing pact with the Muslims of the city that prevented destroying any mosque, the king Jaime I took the Great Mosque or Aljamía to consecrate it to the Virgin Mary, since he had the custom to offer a mass to Our Lady whenever he conquered a village. The cimentation of the cathedral begun in the 13th century, in the same place where the great mosque stood. More on this work


Charles Clifford - 1819 - 1863 
Murcia, 
Puerta de los Apóstoles en la Catedral, 1862 
Papel albuminado
41,3 x 28,1 cm
Private collection

Door of Apostols: Constructed in 1488 by Diego Sánchez de Almazán. It has Gothic style. At the jambs (sides) of the door, the sculptures of the four apostles are shown. It also has a shield which honors the queen Isabel the Catholic.

Charles Clifford - 1819 - 1863 
Orihuela

Puerta de la iglesia de Santiago, 1862 
Papel albuminado, 43,2 x 34,1 cm, tiraje de época 

Church of St. James, probably one of the oldest parishes of Orihuela, some authors suggest it is of Visigoth origin. The site was originally occupied by a mosque. After the reconquest was built as a church that follows the model of Mediterranean Gothic, a single nave with chapels between buttresses and probably a presbytery straight. During the sixteenth century the church suffered a major extension to the head, where the chapel and sacristy, two elements that give it it's unique character, were raised in Renaissance style. More on Church of St. James

Charles Clifford - 1819 - 1863 
Barcelona, 
puerta gótica de Santa María del Mar, 1860 
Papel albuminado
40 x 29 cm
Private collection

Santa Maria by the sea, is an imposing church in the Ribera district of Barcelona, Spain, built between 1329 and 1383 at the height of Catalonia's maritime and mercantile preeminence. It is an outstanding example of Catalan Gothic, with a purity and unity of style that is very unusual in large medieval buildings. More on Santa Maria by the sea

 Charles Clifford - 1819 - 1863 
Alcántara, 
arco romano en el centro del puente, 1859 
Papel albuminado
42,5x29,5 cm
Private collection

The Alcántara Bridge (also known as Puente Trajan at Alcantara) is a Roman stone arch bridge built over the Tagus River at Alcántara, Spain, between 104 and 106 AD by an order of the Roman Emperor Trajan in 98. It bears the inscription Pontem perpetui mansurum in saecula (I have built a bridge which will last forever) on the archway over the central pier. More on The Alcántara Bridge

Charles Clifford - 1819 - 1863 
Toledo, 
Puerta del Hospital de la Santa Cruz, 1858 
Papel albuminado
39x32 cm
Private collection


The Museum of Santa Cruz is located in Toledo, Spain. The building was originally an hospital, the Holly Cross Hospital. Designed by Enrique Egas who received the commission from the Cardinal Pedro González de Mendoza, the hospital was a charitable institution for the care of the sick, old and poor. More on The Museum of Santa Cruz

Charles Clifford - 1819 - 1863 
Toledo, Catedral, 
Puerta del Perdón, c. 1859 
Papel albuminado
43x31 cm
Private collection

The Primate Cathedral of Saint Mary of Toledo is a Roman Catholic cathedral in Toledo, Spain. It stands on the former Great Mosque of Toledo, which itself stands on a Visigothic church; this habit of building on top of previous pieces of architecture was a way of showing dominance and power over previous civilizations or rulings.

It is one of the three 13th-century High Gothic cathedrals in Spain and is considered to be the magnum opus of the Gothic style in Spain. It was begun in 1226 under the rule of Ferdinand III and the last Gothic contributions were made in the 15th century when, in 1493, the vaults of the central nave were finished during the time of the Catholic Monarchs. 

It was modeled after the Bourges Cathedral, although its five naves plan is a consequence of the constructors' intention to cover all of the sacred space of the former city mosque with the cathedral, and of the former sahn with the cloister. More on Cathedral of Saint Mary of Toledo

Charles Clifford - 1819 - 1863 
Toledo, 
Puerta de los Leones, 1858 
Papel albuminado
42,2 x 33,1 cm
Private collection

Catedral de Santa María de Toledo, a building of Gothic architecture , considered by some to be the magnum opus one style Gothic in Spain. Its construction started in 1226 under the reign of Ferdinand III and the last Gothic contributions were in the fifteenth century when in 1493 the vaults of the foot of the central nave, in times of closed Catholic Monarchs . It is built with white stone Olihuelas.


Lions Gate is named for the lions that crown the columns of the gate that closes the small compass.

Charles Clifford - 1819 - 1863 
Ávila, 
Entrada de la misma, 1860 
Papel albuminado
27,5x41 cm
Private collection

Ávila, capital of the Spanish province of the same name, is a city in the rolling hill country northwest of Madrid. It’s best known for its intact medieval city walls, with 80-plus crenelated, semicircular towers and 9 gates, including the arched El Alcázar, on the eastern side. Long sections atop the walls are walkable

After the fall of the Western Roman Empire, Ávila became a stronghold of the Visigoths. Conquered by the Arabs (who called it Ābila, آبلة), it was repeatedly attacked by the northern Iberian Christian kingdoms, becoming a virtually uninhabited no man's land. It was repopulated about 1088 following the definitive reconquest of the area by Raymond of Burgundy. He employed two foreigners, Casandro Romano and Florin de Pituenga, to construct a stone frontier town and creating the walls that still stand. More on Avila

Charles Clifford - 1819 - 1863 
Salamanca, Catedral, Puerta Norte, 1858
Albumen print
16 1/8 x 11 5/8 in.
Private collection

The cathedral was founded by Bishop Jerome of Périgord, in the 12th century and completed in Romanesque/Gothic style in the 14th century. It is dedicated to Santa Maria de la Sede (Saint Mary of the Site).


Among the ornate carvings on the façade is the incongruous likeness of an astronaut floating in space. During recent restoration work, and one of the artisans engaged in the project chose to engage in a bit of tradition by "signing" his work with a contemporary symbol representative of the 20th century: an astronaut. Another is a dragon with ice cream

Charles Clifford - 1819 - 1863 
Salamanca, 
Puerta de la Biblioteca de la Universidad, c. 1858 
Papel albuminado
43x33,4 cm
Private collection

The University of Salamanca is a higher education institution. It was founded in 1134 and given the Royal charter of foundation by King Alfonso IX in 1218. It is the oldest founded university in Spain and the fourth oldest European university in continuous operations.
While Columbus was lobbying the King and Queen for a contract to seek out a western route to the Indies, he made his case to a council of geographers at the University of Salamanca. In the next century, the morality of colonization in the Indies was debated by the School of Salamanca, along with questions of economics, philosophy and theology. More on The University of Salamanca

Charles Clifford - 1819 - 1863 
Valladolid, 
San Gregorio, 1858 
Papel albuminado
42,8x31,2 cm
Private collection

The Colegio de San Gregorio is a historical building in Valladolid, Spain, currently housing the National Museum of Sculpture. It is one of the best examples of architecture in the period of the Catholic Monarchs in Spain (late 15th-early 16th centuries), and was founded as a Theology College for the Dominican order. More on The Colegio de San Gregorio

Charles Clifford (Wales, c. 1820 — Madrid, 1 January 1863) was a Welsh photographer based mainly in Spain. Clifford, known mostly for his daguerreotype, calotype and wet plate collodion images of scenes from around Spain, he was, together with the French photographer, Jean Laurent, one of the leading photographers of his day in Spain. Queen Victoria and Prince Albert are known to have purchased some of Clifford's Spanish photographs in 1854, and in 1861, he published two volumes, containing a series of 159 prints commissioned by Queen Victoria, Prince Albert, the King and Queen of Spain, the Emperors of France, Russia and Austria, the Duc de Montpensier, among others. Although known mainly for his collections of photographs of landscapes, monuments and public works, he was commissioned to carry out a portrait of Queen Victoria at Windsor Castle (her notes in her Journal for 14 November 1861 state she was ‘dressed in evening dress, with diadem & jewels’ and was ‘photographed for the Queen of Spain by Mr Clifford. He brought me one of hers, taken by him’. It was possibly one of the last portraits taken of the queen wearing a colour), and was also named Court Photographer to the Queen of Spain, accompanying her on the royal tour of Andalucia in 1862. More

Charles Marville - 1816 - 1879
Catedral de Chartres, c. 1853
Papel salado
25,8 x 36 cm
Private collection

Chartres Cathedral is a medieval Catholic cathedral of the Latin Church located in Chartres, France, about 80 kilometres (50 mi) southwest of Paris. It is considered one of the finest examples of French Gothic architecture. The current cathedral is the last of at least five which have occupied the site since the town became a bishopric in the 4th century.

Auguste Salzmann - 1824 - 1872 
Jerusalén, 
Santo Sepulcro, 1854 
Salted paper
33.2 x 22.9 cm
Private collection

The Holy Sepulcher is a religious sanctuary of Christianity , located in the city of Jerusalem . The site, also called Golgotha ​​(in Aramaic , Golgotha, 'skull'), is the exact spot where, according to the Gospels - was the crucifixion , burial and resurrection of Christ . It is located within the Old City of Jerusalem.

The temple of the Holy Sepulchre he is also known as Church of the Resurrection . It is one of the holiest centers of Christianity and has been an important center of pilgrimage since the fourth century. Today it houses the headquarters of the Orthodox Patriarch of Jerusalem and is the cathedral of the Latin Patriarchate of Jerusalem. More on The Holy Sepulcher

Auguste Salzmann 1824 - 1872 
Jerusalem Ecce Homo Arch, 1854 
Salted paper
32.5 x 23.5 cm
Private collection

The Ecce Homo is a Roman Catholic church in the Via Dolorosa in Jerusalem , on the road, according to Christian tradition, Jesus walked, carrying his cross, on the way to his crucifixion . The church is part of the Convent of the Sisters of Zion. More on Ecce Homo

Auguste Salzmann, born 14 April 1824 in Ribeauvillé (Alsace) and died 24 February 1872 in Paris, is a French photographer who was devoted mainly to archeology and the Middle East. Born into a wealthy family of industrialists Alsatian, he began his career as a painter, framed by his brother Henri-Gustave, and he just display their works at the Paris Salon in 1847, 1849 and 1850.

Besides the drawings of landscapes and religious scenes, he is also dedicated to archeology and photography. From an early age, he developed a keen interest in the Middle East, traveled to Italy and Algeria with his friend Eugene Fromentin, and visited the Egypt at the same time that Auguste Mariette was there making ​​great discoveries (1850). In 1853, a mission entrusted to him, at his request, by the Ministry of Education to study the passage of the remnants Hospitallers of St. John on the island of Rhodes. However it did not go to Rhodes, but finally decided to go to Palestine. He took an interest in the controversies raised in Europe at the time about the results of Felicien Saulcy's dating of the ramparts of Jerusalem. He took 200 calotypes used to support claims of Saulcy regarding the age of many existing buildings in the city. These images are often considered the first application of photography in archaeological work. But he must interrupt the trip due to illness. More on Auguste Salzmann


Leopoldo Alinari (1832-65) 
Paradise door by L. Ghiberti, Italy, around 1855 
Calotype
33.9 (H) x 6 (W) cm
Private collection

This calotype has been taken around the year 1855 by the Italian photographer Leopoldo Alinari. The motif presents the eastern door of the baptistery of Florence, the so-called door of paradise, which was created by Lorenzo Ghiberti in the years between 1425 and 1452. The ten gilded panels present scenes of the Old Testament.

Leopoldo Alinari (1832–1865) founded a small photographic studio in the Via Cornina in Florence in the year 1852. His two brothers, Romualdo Alinari (1830–1890) and Giuseppe Alinari (1836–1890), became his partners in the year 1854. Their studio was called Fratelli Alinari (Alinari Brothers) and was specialized in portraits and artistic architectural photography. In the following year, the Alinaris had their first presentation at the Paris International Exposition that made them very popular. In 1855, their sales catalogue contained 84 photographs with motifs of Florence, Pisa and Siena and several other places. The Alinari archive holds more than 5.5 million photographs from all over the world. More on Leopold Alinari




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