Japan—Felice Beato | Album of 50 photographs of Japanese portraits and views. [Yokohama, circa. 1868]

Property of a Gentleman

Japan—Felice Beato

Album of 50 photographs of portraits, scenes, manners, customs and views of Japan. [Yokohama, circa. 1869]

Large oblong folio (350 x 470mm.), 50 albumen prints (average 230 x 270mm., or the reverse), of which 24 hand-tinted, mounted on card with descriptive letterpress text mounted facing each photograph on verso of the preceding mount, contemporary red cloth-backed brocade boards, preserved in a modern folding cloth box, spine split with some loss, corners rubbed

A RARE ALBUM OF FINE EARLY PHOTOGRAPHS OF JAPAN BY FELICE BEATO (1832-1909), with views of Yokohama, the Tokaido, Hakoni, Yedo, Nagasaki, Kanagawa, and Mount Fuji, together with traditional subjects, manners and customs of Japanese life and culture including ladies at rest, at leisure and at their toilet, a street refreshment stall, a military officer, a barber, travelling dentist, playing Go, street musicians, sake sellers, sedan chair carriers etc.

Beato was a pioneer foreign photographer in Japan, who first settled in Yokohama, Japan's major treaty port. He offered his first photographic albums for sale in 1868, and this album was part of that enterprise. The printed text that accompanies the photographs was written for a Western audience and describes places to see, suggesting itineraries and tips to visitors, as well as providing extensive descriptions of famous monuments, landscapes, and towns of Japan. Beato's photographs of Japan rapidly became a commercial success and were imitated by his competitors and later photographers.