About this artwork
An amateur archaeologist trained as a painter, Auguste Salzmann learned photography in order to document archaeological finds in the field. He traveled to Jersualem in 1853, photographing holy sites for a year, until he was stricken by fever and forced to return home with some 150 paper negatives. The resulting prints were published in 1856 by the noted printer Louis-Désiré Blanquart-Evrard as a tourist album on the monuments of Jerusalem, available for purchase by the public; in the introduction, Salzmann wrote, “Photographs are not reports, but rather conclusive brute facts.” Despite this assertion, his choice of medium did act as a vehicle of interpretation: the salted paper print gave a somewhat softened, textured appearance to the stone ruins, increasing the suggestion of nostalgia latent in the combination of archeology and tourism.
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Status
- Currently Off View
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Department
- Photography and Media
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Artist
- Auguste Salzmann
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Title
- Jerusalem, Valley of Josaphat, Tomb of St. James (Jérusalem, Vallée de Josaphat, Tombeau de Saint Jacques)
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Place
- France (Artist's nationality:)
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Date
- Made 1854
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Medium
- Salted paper print
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Dimensions
- Image: 23.4 × 32.2 cm (9 1/4 × 12 11/16 in.); Paper: 41.4 × 58.5 cm (16 5/16 × 23 1/16 in.)
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Credit Line
- Purchased with funds provided by Helen Harvey Mills in memory of her mother Kathleen W. Harvey
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Reference Number
- 1980.215
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IIIF Manifest
- https://api.artic.edu/api/v1/artworks/60084/manifest.json