Hunting Travel Recollections

The Serbian Trumpeter

Ridinger, Johann Elias (Ulm 1698 – Augsburg 1767). In the Year 1728. His High Princely Serene Highness Carl Alexander Duke of Wurttemberg has shot this Stag in a Hunt at Barackin in the Kingdom of Serbia. Rolled-on photograph by Johann Laifle (ascertainable as active Regensburg 1865 – about 1900). (1865.) Inscribed: Joh. El. Riedinger (sic!) del. sculps. et excud. Aug. Vind., otherwise in German as above & on the mounting carton: 13. / Photographirt von J. Laifle. / Verlag von A. Coppenrath in Regensburg. Size of photo 6½ × 5⅛ in (16.5 × 13.1 cm), of carton 12⅞ × 10 in (32.8 × 25.4 cm).

“ The strong antlers bowed at the end

end in the shape like a trumpet . ”

Sheet 13 of the 50-sheet Laifle set published in 5 numbers as plate 9 of the Most Wondrous Deer, Thienemann 251. The bibliographical literature only records the 1^st number of the album. – Cf. the illustration in the exhibition catalog Johann Elias Ridinger, National Museum Kielce/Poland, 1997, no. 99. – On paper coated with the white of egg, that is

albumen print “ of high gloss … (which) renders the most minute details ”

(Meyers Konversations-Lexikon, 4^th ed., XIII [1889], page 17, yet recording it as standard a quarter of a century later only). This in contrast to the previously common papers coated with starch, hence resulting in a dull image effect, which consequently could not meet the standards of the great Ridinger collector Coppenrath as the publisher. And Danuta Thiel-Melerski 2006:

“ The first photographs on albumen paper were so thin

one had to glue them onto cardboard ”

As here then, too. By Johann Laifle’s “Photographic Institute for Portraits and Landscapes” at Klarenanger No. 2 in Regensburg. His Ridinger Album. A Collection of the Finest and Rarest Deer and Roebuck Abnormities photographed from the Original Engravings – complete showcase copy available here – supposedly representing both Laifle’s earliest group of works as also

the earliest Ridinger photographicum

in general. In short ,

the youthful photography is enthusiastic about Ridinger

and therewith bestows a collection enrichment of the most charming kind . Up to the spot on the wall !

Of significantly more comprehensive sets announced by two competitors between 1867 and 1873/75 nevertheless 24 and 48 sheet resp. seem to have been realized only and therefore take second place to Coppenrath’s pioneer edition not just chronologically. In such a manner Laifle & Coppenrath not only were the first to pay their photographic reverence to Ridinger, rather this even in virtually chronological setting as

incunabula of photography !

Laifle’s late period documented here besides by a “Portrait Postcard System Laifle.” from 1899, by which individual portrait photographs were applied to Laifle’s landscape postcards. Laifle won medals at the World Exposition Vienna 1873 & 1876 in Munich.

Offer no. 15,681 | EUR 98. (c. US$ 118.) + shipping

also see
Hermann Menzler’s scenically varying
simultaneous tinted lithograph
as of pictorially quite distinct charm

“ … and I wish to thank you for packing it so carefully … ”

(Mr. P. M., August 28, 2003)

The Cream of the Day