Lot Essay
Approximately half the images are landscapes. These include river scenes and views around Nikko, Hakone, Enoshima, Shiva, Tokio and Fujiyama. The remainder are portraits of tradespeople, shopkeepers, geisha, musicians, wrestlers, samurai, priests, a group portrait of an elderly woman with thirteen children, portraits of the Emperor and Empress of Japan from negatives by Uchida (see also lot 48) and three Chinese portraits.
Examples of two of the images in this album appear in Views of Japan by Beato in the collection of the Victoria and Albert Museum.
In 1877, Beato sold his studio and stock to the Austrian, Baron Raimund von Stillfried-Rathenicz and in the 1880s, the accumulated stock of Beato and Stillfried was sold again. Most stock went to the Italian photographer, Alphonso Farsari, but Kusakabe Kimbei, who had previously been one of Stillfried's assistants, also bought a quantity of photographs. Each photographer continued to sell prints from the negatives of the earlier photographers alongside his own work and by the late 1880s and 1890s prints from the most popular negatives appeared with different reference numbers and/or titles in the negatives. This has made the definite attribution of specific images to specific photographers very difficult. A comparison of prints in the Lau collection has been made with those in the Victoria & Albert Museum and other private collections in England and attributions made to individual photographers wherever possible.
No photographs known to be printed by Beato before 1868 have either numbers or titles in the negatives, and it was only in the mid to late 1870s that the law necessitated the introduction of numbers, effectively for copyright purposes. Several of the photographs in this album are identifiable as from negatives by Beato and many are titled in a squared upper case in the negatives, but none are numbered. It must post-date 1872 because of the inclusion of the Imperial portraits, but it seems unlikely that it would have been compiled after the sale of the Beato studio to Stillfried, as it would then have been more likely that negative numbers would have been added. The format and style of binding is typical of those often used by Beato for the series sold from 1868. It is possible that the titling and some of the photographs may be the work of Beato's assistant, Woolett, who came to Japan from Shanghai.
Examples of two of the images in this album appear in Views of Japan by Beato in the collection of the Victoria and Albert Museum.
In 1877, Beato sold his studio and stock to the Austrian, Baron Raimund von Stillfried-Rathenicz and in the 1880s, the accumulated stock of Beato and Stillfried was sold again. Most stock went to the Italian photographer, Alphonso Farsari, but Kusakabe Kimbei, who had previously been one of Stillfried's assistants, also bought a quantity of photographs. Each photographer continued to sell prints from the negatives of the earlier photographers alongside his own work and by the late 1880s and 1890s prints from the most popular negatives appeared with different reference numbers and/or titles in the negatives. This has made the definite attribution of specific images to specific photographers very difficult. A comparison of prints in the Lau collection has been made with those in the Victoria & Albert Museum and other private collections in England and attributions made to individual photographers wherever possible.
No photographs known to be printed by Beato before 1868 have either numbers or titles in the negatives, and it was only in the mid to late 1870s that the law necessitated the introduction of numbers, effectively for copyright purposes. Several of the photographs in this album are identifiable as from negatives by Beato and many are titled in a squared upper case in the negatives, but none are numbered. It must post-date 1872 because of the inclusion of the Imperial portraits, but it seems unlikely that it would have been compiled after the sale of the Beato studio to Stillfried, as it would then have been more likely that negative numbers would have been added. The format and style of binding is typical of those often used by Beato for the series sold from 1868. It is possible that the titling and some of the photographs may be the work of Beato's assistant, Woolett, who came to Japan from Shanghai.