Pwt 28 2016 Ballooning: Let's Get Up High

WEEKLY TRANSMISSION N°28 SUMMERTIME:

THURSDAY 14TH JULY 2016

LET'S GET UP HIGH, OBSERVE AND PHOTOGRAPH FROM ABOVE

n°4, detail

PWT 28-2016 CONTENTS : Rising up in the Tethered Balloon «L’attrait que j’ai pour la mer ...»

Fukuhara or Kobe Ferry Terminal Yak-Riding A Tribute to T. E. Lawrence

1-3 4-6 7 8 9

n°2, detail

The e-bulletin presents articles as well as selections of books, albums, photographs and documents as they have been handed down to the actual owners by their creators and by amateurs from past generations.

The physical descriptions, attributions, origins, and printing dates of the books and photographs have been carefully ascertained by collations and through close analysis of comparable works.

When items are for sale, the prices are in Euros, and Paypal is accepted.

N°28 : LET'S GET UP HIGH

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n°3, detail

Let's get up high, observe and photograph from above French chemist, balloonist, aviator and editor Gaston Tissandier published «La photographie en ballon». This pamphlet included an original photographic print by Jacques Ducom mounted on stiff card with a tissue overlay key (frontispice). This additional key was thought necessary because most people were unaccustomed to an aerial point of view.

The history of aerial photography began in 1858, when Felix Nadar took the first photographs from a balloon. His results were only partially successful, as were those of other experimenters who followed him, and it was not until 1878, when factory-made gelatin dry plates were introduced, that aerial photography came into its own. Using gelatin plates, which were twenty times faster than the old wet-collodion plates, the photographer Paul Desmarets obtained two birds-eye views of Rouen in 1880 from a balloon at 4,200 feet. However, Desmarets' results were surpassed five years later by Jacques Ducom, who, in a balloon navigated by Gaston Tissandier, was able to take superb aerial photographs of Paris from a height of 1,800 feet (1885).

The exposure of these photographs taken on this flight was about 1/50 second, using a specially constructed guillotine shutter which was opened and closed pneumatically with a rubber spring. Tissandier's La photographie en ballon records Ducom's achievements in aerial photography. The preface mentions the pioneering aerial photograph of Boston taken in 1860

by J. W. Black from a tethered balloon at 1,200 feet. (Frizot, A New History of Photography).

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Attr. JACQUES DUCOM (1861-1935). Preparing the Tethered Balloon, France, c.1883.

Printing out paper (aristotype), 180x120 mm, mounted on board. From the collection of Jacques Ducom, amateur photographer and friend of the Tissandier brothers.

200 euros

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Attr. JACQUES DUCOM (1861-1935). Rising up in the Tethered Balloon, France, c.1883.

Printing out paper (aristotype), 195x130 mm, mounted on board. From the collection of J. Ducom.

200 euros

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Attr. JACQUES DUCOM (1861-1935). Balloon in Sunny Sky, France, c.1883. Vintage p.o.p. (printing out paper, or aristotype), 205x135 mm, mounted on cabinat card, a few alterations.

From the collection of J. Ducom.

100 euros

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KODAK BROWNIA AMATEUR. Marie-Sophie, or Square Port View, Marseilles, c.1905.

Vintage square silver print, 130x130 mm.

200 euros «... l’attrait que j’ai pour la mer va au delà de tout ce qu’on imagine. Je puis en faire l’aveu, et non pas en assigner les causes, car enfin s’il est vrai que la vue de cet élément me rappelle aux premières années de ma jeunesse, il ne l’est pas moins que cette époque de la vie doit offrir aux souvenirs des repos plus agréables...»

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UNIDENTIFIED PHOTOGRAPHER. Sail or Modernist Composition, 1930s. Tiny vintage silver print on matte paper, 120x80 mm.

200 euros «... ou plutôt ce qui est vrai pour d’autres, ne l’est pas pour moi. En effet, si je regarde en arrière sur quelques années passées entre la poussière des in-folio, le tourbillon du monde et les bourrasques de la mer, ce n’est pas sur des instants de dissipation, d’illusion même, que je me plais à arrêter ma vue ; je leur préfère encore ces longues nuits consacrées à l’étude dans le silence du cabinet....»

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IVAN SHAGIN (1904-1982). Russian Marine from the the Red-Banner Baltic Fleet, 1940.

Carefully printed by the artist in the 1970s on double-weight paper, 240x180 mm, stamped, strong contrast. From the family of the artist.

900 euros «... Mais qu’avec bien plus de délices ma pensée se rapporte au temps où étonnée de la force naissante, elle m’était jamais plus active que lorsqu’elle ne s’occupait d’aucun objet en particulier, et que facile à s’égarer, d’un élan elle se portait au delà de toute les choses existantes ; c’est alors que j’habitais des vaisseaux.» (Jan Potocki, Voyage en Turquie, 1788).

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Thursday 14 July 2016

Attrib. SAKAI KIYOSHIRO. Waiting Area in Kobe Ferry Terminal, 1930.

Vintage exhibition silver print on matte paper, 220x280 mm, found with an album with a dedication page dated December 1930.

1.500 euros Throughout medieval era, the port of Kobe was known as Hyogo no Tsu. Under the name of Fukuhara-kyo, it was the seat of Japan's Imperial Court, and therefore the capital of the country, for roughly six months in 1180. But many of the nobles complained of the wet weather of the port city and the distance from Heian. In 1858, the Treaty of Amity and Commerce opened the Hyogo Port to foreigners.

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UNIDENTIFIED SOVIET PHOTOGRAPHER. Swiss Yak Expedition, Kyrgyzstan, 1931. Vintage silver print, 130x180 mm, dated in pencil, verso.

150 euros During the period, Ella Maillart was travelling in Central Asia, her photographic work is deposited at the Musée de l'Élysée.

«Yaks are large, hairy animals who live on high elevations from 2000 m up to the treeline above 5000 m. Outside of the Himalayas and Hindukush, yak herding is common in Tajikistan, Mongolia and Xinjiang province in China, and small herds exist in Afghanistan and Kyrgyzstan.

Riding a yak will require some communication skills on your side, or a guide or translator, to negotiate the rent or purchase of your very own yak...» (Plan your Trip, 2016).

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UNIDENTIFIED PHOTOGRAPHER. A Tribute to T. E. Lawrence, c.1920. Vintage silver enlargement, 290x230 mm, on original mount.

300 euros

n°9, detail

“... The people of England have been led in Mesopotamia into a trap from which it will be hard to escape with dignity and honor.

They have been tricked into it by a steady withholding of information.

The Baghdad communiques are belated, insincere, incomplete.

Things have been far worse than we have been told, our administration more bloody and inefficient than the public knows.

It is a disgrace to our imperial record, and may soon be too inflamed for any ordinary cure. We are today not far from a disaster...»

(Thomas Edward Lawrence, "Report on Mesopotamia" The Sunday Times, 22 August 1920)

Number Twenty-Eight, Second Season, of the Weekly Transmission has been uploaded on Thursday 14th July 2016 at 15:15 (Paris time).

Forthcoming uploads and transmissions on Thursdays : Thursday 21th July, Thursday 28th July, 15:15 (Paris time). serge@plantureux.fr

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