Ancient Photographs of Rome with related Drawings and Paintings of the sites
Like every year, at Christmas time the Paolo Antonacci Gallery organizes a theme exhibition. This year the subject is a choice of XIX Century views of Rome. A selection of 40 ancient photographs of Rome will be presented together with drawings and watercolours of the XIX Century.
The photographs, taken from an unknown album recently discovered in the UK, date back to the years of experimentation of new techniques such as the albumin print. These views witness the aspect of Rome before the urban changes of the XX Century and are also important because were created by famous artists that made the History of Photography in Rome during the second half of the XIX Century.
There will be presented photographs by Gioacchino Altobelli and Pompeo Molins, both nominated Official Photographers of the Imperial Academy of France and of the Artworks for the Italian Railways, and by Tommaso Cuccioni, that was one of the first to exhibit in his atelier-shop in “Via Condotti” views of Rome made by himself and by his colleagues. His friend Giacomo Caneva will be represented as well at the exhibition, like James Anderson, Adriano De Bonis, Giorgio Sommer, Filippo e Umberto Reale, Gustave Emile Chaffourier, Michele Mang, Pierre Petit.
Furthermore, the exhibition comprehends drawings and watercolours of Rome in the XIX Century largely coming from the private collection of Iohan Quirijn van Regteren Altena (1899-1980). Altena was an eminent Dutch art historian; from 1923 to 1926 he contributed to the cataloguing of several North European Artist’s sketches exposed at the Louvre Museum and at the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam.
The exhibition will be open at the Paolo Antonacci Gallery from December 13, 2015 to January 16, 2016.
