Art Institute of Chicago

Jerusalem, Valley of Josaphat, Tomb of St. James (Jérusalem, Vallée de Josaphat, Tombeau de Saint Jacques)

Auguste Salzmann

Date

1854, printed 1856

Medium

Salted paper print

Culture

France

Department

Photography and Media

Institution

Art Institute of Chicago

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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