Stamboul. Moeurs et Costumes by PREZIOSI, Amadeo (1816-1882) - 1883

Paris: Canson, 1883. Folio. (24 1/4 x 18 1/2 inches). Mounted on guards throughout. Letterpress title printed in red and black, letterpress introduction leaf and letterpress list of plates. Tinted lithographic frontispiece printed by Lemercier of Paris, 28 chromolithographic plates, trimmed to the edge of the image and mounted on thick paper with imprints, as issued, all by Lemercier of Paris after Preziosi. Bound to style in full period brown morocco, covers elaborately bordered in gilt, spine gilt with raised bands, marbled endpapers, gilt edges Lively lithographs by one of the best known of the artists living and working in Istanbul in the mid-19th century: one of 500 numbered copies. The son of Count Gio Francois Preziosi of Malta, Amadeo initially studied the law before turning to painting. After studying under Giuseppe Hyzler, Perziosi subsequently completed his art education at the Paris Academy of Fine Arts. He moved to Constantinople in 1842, fell in love with the city, and was able to make a living painting the places and people that surrounded him. It is noted in the Atabey catalogue that "Preziosi was well-known .... His studio is mentioned in Murray's guidebooks for 1854 and 1871. By that time he had become an institution in the city... He produced views of the city, and genre and costume drawings" ( The Ottoman World p.535). His paintings sold well to both the affluent local and the Grand Tourist, and his reputation was such that also served as a court painter to Sultan Abdul Hamid II. With his published work, Preziosi was offered the opportunity to share his love of his adopted home city with a wider public: he here offers a catalogue of daily life in the city; an aide-memoire and a momento. The work offers a real cross-section of humanity, ranging from a street performance by a family of gypsies and their bear, to street vendors, to established shopkeepers of various kinds, to military and religious figures, to high-class Turkish ladies, to a powerful eunuch of the Sultan's seraglio. But behind the main figures, can be glimpsed locations and small incidents that are what gives the city its unique quality: from the Süleymaniye Mosque to the Bosphorus, from the shops in the alley-ways, the coffee houses, to the courtyard of the sultan. First published in 1858, the present re-issue, limited to 500 numbered copies, was published under the direction of the Encyclopédie des Arts Décoratifs de L'Orient. Colas 2423; Blackmer 1353 (1865 edition); Atabey 999 (1861 edition).