Photograph of Wagner, signed ("Richard Wagner") on the lower mount, showing him three-quarter length, facing to his right and attired in his characteristic velvet jacket and cap, with his right hand tucked into his breast carte-de-visite format, backing possibly removed, size of image 89 x 56mm. [studio of Pierre-Louis Pierson, Paris, between 28 October and 4 November 1867]

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A RENOWNED PORTRAIT PHOTOGRAPH OF RICHARD WAGNER, taken a few days after he had completed Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg. Having finished the full score of the opera on 24 October 1867, Wagner visited Paris for the Universal Exhibition between 28 October and 4 November (during the closing day of which, he had, as he studied the vast crowds of school children who had free entry, a vision of ʻall vices of the world-metropolis in embryo', which by his own account reduced him to a sobbing wreck; see his essay ʻDear Herr von Stein' in Religion and Art, translated by William Ashton Ellis, 1897, p. 326). This is one of four photographs of him taken at this time at the studio of Pierre-Louis Pierson, court photographer to Napoleon III and especially well-known today for his collaboration with the Countess de Castiglione (including the proto-surreal Scherzo di Follia, showing her holding an empty picture frame to her eye). See illustration on preceding page.

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WAGNER (RICHARD) Photograph of Wagner, signed ("Richard Wagner") on the lower mount, showing him three-quarter length, facing to his right and attired in his characteristic velvet jacket and cap, [studio of Pierre-Louis Pierson, Paris, between 28 October and 4 November 1867]

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WAGNER (RICHARD)
Photograph of Wagner, signed ("Richard Wagner") on the lower mount, showing him three-quarter length, facing to his right and attired in his characteristic velvet jacket and cap, [studio of Pierre-Louis Pierson, Paris, between 28 October and 4 November 1867]