Item #5195 Champney’s Great Original Picture of the River Rhine and Its Banks, and Two Superb Tableaux of Scenes of the French Revolution of 1848. Benjamin Champney.
Champney’s Great Original Picture of the River Rhine and Its Banks, and Two Superb Tableaux of Scenes of the French Revolution of 1848.
Champney’s Great Original Picture of the River Rhine and Its Banks, and Two Superb Tableaux of Scenes of the French Revolution of 1848.

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Champney, Benjamin.

Champney’s Great Original Picture of the River Rhine and Its Banks, and Two Superb Tableaux of Scenes of the French Revolution of 1848.

[Boston]: Bee Press, ca. 1850. Broadside, 59 x 18.5 cm.

A rare broadside advertising Benjamin Champney’s celebrated panorama of the Rhine River and two tableaux of scenes of the French Revolution of 1848.

Painter Benjamin Champney’s panorama of the Rhine River was first exhibited in December of 1848. It appeared in Boston, elsewhere in New England, and in New York, where it was destroyed by fire in October of 1857. For the exhibition advertised here, Champney added two recently painted tableaux depicting “two of the most prominent features of the 1848 French Revolution”: The Burning of the Throne and Lamartine at the Hotel de Ville. Champney’s paintings are presented as unusually accomplished:

The picture of the Rhine has been received with universal favor, and pronounced by connoisseurs of art to be by far the most elaborate and beautiful of all the Panoramic views that have been produced. There is an artistic finish and naturalness of manner, which renders the Painting entirely illusive, and the spectator is at once transported to the Banks of this River of romance and beauty. The Tableaux now added are executed with great spirit and truthfulness, and represent some of the most intensely interesting scenes enacted during the great Revolution which overthrew the government of Louis Phillippe.

The four sections of the panorama as well as the tableaux are described in detail, and the whole is characterised as “the most pleasing and attractive exhibition ever presented to the public.” Single tickets were priced at 50 cents; children were admitted half-price, and tickets admitting a gentleman and two ladies were priced $1.

A central figure in the White Mountain School of painting, Champney (1817–1907) was a native of New Hampshire and founder of the North Conway Colony. After spending much of the 1840s studying and traveling throughout Europe, he returned to the U.S. where he gained considerable fame showing his panorama.

Rare. No copies recorded in WorldCat.

REFERENCES: Benjamin Champney at newhampshirelakesandmountains.com

CONDITION: Old folds, chipping at margins, one 2 cm tear at margin along old fold, light creasing at top and bottom, some wear to middle fold, no losses to the text.

Item #5195

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