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Holdings Information

    • Title:[Camera obscura].
    • Published/Created:[Germany?], [mid-19th century]
    • Physical Description:1 camera obscura ; 8.3 cm high x 7.8 cm in diameter
    • Yale Holdings

      • Location:BRITISH ART CENTER, Rare Bks & Mss (Non-Circulating)
      • Call Number: TR268 .C36 Flat
      • Status:Not Checked Out
      • Notes: Restricted fragile material. Use requires permission of the Curator of Rare Books and Manuscripts.
      • Provenance:Yale Center for British Art, Paul Mellon Fund
       
    • Access and use:Restricted fragile material. Use requires permission of the Curator of Rare Books and Manuscripts.
    • Biographical / Historical note:"[A camera obscura is a] light-tight box with a small hole in one side, sometimes fitted with a lens, through which light from a well-lit scene or object enters to form an inverted image on a screen placed opposite the hole. A mirror then reflects the image, right way up, on to a drawing surface where its outlines can be traced. The camera obscura was the direct precursor of the modern camera, and its use by earlier artists can be compared to that made of the camera by artists of the 19th and 20th centuries."--Harvey.
    • Summary:Small camera obscura with lens, reflecting mirror, and glass, used as a drawing aid. The device may be of German manufacture, from the mid-19th century. The main body of the camera obscura is made of a paper-board tube--with flat surfaces at each end--the exterior of which is covered in blue marbled paper. The top is covered by a cap, similarly constructed, which when removed reveals the glass surface on to which the camera's image is projected. The image enters the camera via a lens tube (32 mm in diameter) protruding from the side of the instrument; this lens also has a removable cap.
      It is likely that the present camera obscura was intended as a toy or curiosity, as the glass tracing surface is too small to be considered practical.
    • Format:Visual Material
    • References:Harvey, J.C. "Camera obscura." Grove Art Online. Oxford Art Online.
      Kemp, M. Science of art, p. 188, etc.
    • Subjects:Artists' tools--Specimens.
    • Subjects (Local Yale):Chron.--1840-1860.
    • Genre/Form:Optical instruments.
      Image-projecting equipment.
      Camera obscuras.