Peter Bichsel   Fine Books

Ogawa, K(azumasa). Photographs of Japanese Customs and Manners.

Suite of 49 hand tinted collotypes on 50 plates (1 repeated). 3 leaves title, preface leaf, and colophon. Folio. Orig. colour-decorated silk, bound together with 2 violet ties. Edges gilt. – Yokohama, Hongkong, Shanghai and Singapore, Kelly and Walsh, Meji 31 (i.e. 1898).

Luxurious album with 50 coloured phototypes on the Japanese culture and way of life by Kazumasa Ogawa (1869–1929), most important photographer of the Meji period. In 1889, he founded the first collotype studion in Japan. The photographs show persons in traditional costumes as well as street scenes, a stage play and a wrestling scene. The photographs on plates 10 and 14 are identical. Each photograph is accompanied by a detailed caption. – Boards with some dustsoiling and spots. Crease to upper right corner of plate I, this one as well with some offsetting in the face of the portrayed person. Plate no. XXXI with tear in the upper white margin and with rubbed part in the photograph affecting the face of the standing person. Else clean and fine. – Best.-Nr. 26690