About this sheet
An original antique lithograph portrait of an unidentified decorated gentleman, circa 1887. The sitter is not named on the sheet.
Prints of this kind were issued in their own day for a wide public of collectors, readers and admirers, and where no name is attached they are collected for the quality of the drawing, the character of the face and the hand of the maker.
Lithography was invented by Alois Senefelder in Munich in 1796, and within a generation it had become the favourite medium for the portrait print across the German speaking lands, Austria and France. The artist drew directly on the stone, so a lithographed portrait keeps the softness and immediacy of a chalk drawing, and the portrait lithographers of Vienna, Munich, Dresden and Paris produced likenesses of statesmen, clergy, scholars and private citizens in great numbers between the eighteen twenties and the eighteen sixties.
This sheet comes from a gathering of portraits from across Europe and across two and a half centuries, in engraving, etching and lithography. Portrait prints have been collected in their own right since the eighteenth century, when James Granger's Biographical History of England of 1769 set off a fashion for illustrating books with portraits of the people named in them, and they are still collected today for the sitter, for the maker and for the face itself.
A single portrait frames well in a narrow moulding with a generous mat, and a group of them hung together, whether by period, by profession or simply by the strength of the faces, makes one of the most satisfying walls there is for a study, a library, a landing or a dining room.
The sheet is in good condition for its age, with even toning to the tinted paper and only a few tiny specks in the margins; the portrait itself is clean and strong.
This is an original antique print, not a modern reproduction. This item is sold unframed. Any framed or interior images are shown for presentation and inspiration only, unless the listing explicitly states that the item is sold framed.
