Altenburg / Thuringia – Frank, Gustav (Stralsund 1819 – Dessau 1886). Altenburg. Central view seen from somewhat elevated point. On the right in the foreground two peasants coming out of town. Colored lithograph. Inscribed: N. d. Nat. gez. u. lith. v. Gustav Frank. / Druck d. Königl. lith. Instituts zu Berlin., otherwise as above. C. 1850-80. 37 x 54.5 cm. – Allgemeines Künstlerlexikon XLIV, 38 f.; Thieme-Becker XII, 345.

Very  fine  ,  extremely  rare  view

as all of Frank’s views, qualified first by the union of draughtsman and lithographer, then as “low bird’s eye view” with the motif form of the “inner view”. The

“ manner of the low bird’s eye view was especially popular in the 19^th century since Eduard Gaertner’s Berlin panorama from the rooftop of the Werder’sche Church. Gaertner used a camera obscura for the transfer of the objects of the image onto his sheet what probably also could be assumed for Frank, that clear and detailed the representation appears ”

(Jochen Luckhardt in Lüneburger Beiträge zur Vedutenforschung, 1983, pp. 80 f., by the example of Frank’s view of Münster illustrated and dated as “before 1871”). And

“ Beside (the) possibility to sort of split up the picture of a town there additionally is the solution to renounce the representation of the total and to reproduce instead a detail considered image-worthy, namely the motif of the ‘inner view’ discovered in the 18^th century. ”

Printed by the Berlin Royal Institute of Lithography on wide-margined fine cardboard with some repairs in its outside margins. Partial light browning and little mold stains on verso appearing visibly toned down inside of the subject in the sky and white margin, hardly spoiling though.
Offer no. 15,220 / EUR  1980. / export price EUR  1881. (c. US$ 2418.) + shipping

„ Hartelijk dank voor de zorgvulige wijze … Voor mij bent u de Mercedes onder de prentenhandelaren! “

(de heer P. E., 24. Januar 2008)