Alois Beer. 1900-1910. Photographic panoramas of Garda from the collections of the Kriegsarchiv in Vienna is an exhibition curated by Alberto Prandi, which will remain on display at the Riva del Garda Museum from 14 April to 3 November.
The 350 images were taken by Alois Beer during his photographic travels intended to increase the rich catalog of photographs addressed to the Austro-Hungarian public.
When the Carinthian photographer arrived at Lake Garda, he had long enjoyed great fame, his studio in Klangenfurt was considered one of the most prestigious of the time and the collections of panoramic and urban views included a variety of subjects that contemplated beyond the most significant sites of the The Austro-Hungarian Empire also includes images of Italian, French, Belgian, Spanish, Greek, Egyptian, Palestinian, Turkish, Syrian and North African localities and territories.
Alois Beer, with his panoramic views of Lake Garda, seems to want to re-propose Goethe's amazement at the sight of the lake, and seems to manifest the same need for empathic participation in the imposing spectacle of nature that belonged to romantic culture.
At the time of the Garda photographic campaign, Beer had developed a long tradition of travel, but the experience, the confidence and the frequenting of countries and people so different from each other, had not quenched in him neither the original curiosity that governed the his gaze, nor the ability to photographically represent the naturalistic and environmental aspects of Lake Garda with an absolutely original individual figure, emphasizing its atmospheric effects, the perspective gradients, the contrasts between the elements, without ever indulging in pictorial inflections so fashionable at the time.
Alois Beer, born in Budapest to a Carinthian family, just twenty-three years old opened his own photographic studio in Vienna and shortly after a branch in Klagenfurt where he moved, leaving the Viennese studio to his partner Ferdinad Meyer with whom he opened another branch in Graz. His ateliers were frequented by who aspired to a portrait of him while his commitments in external settings grew. He was commissioned to document photographic campaigns, for example, of the new railway lines of the Empire and in 1882 he was awarded the title of Photographer of the Imperial Royal Court, a recognition to which was added that of Photographer of the Imperial Royal Navy.
1879, in particular, was a decisive year: Beer published a report on the damage caused by an avalanche to the Carinthian towns of Bleiberg and Hüttendorf and, a few months later, was awarded the gold medal for art and science thus gaining the attention of the national scene.
In this period he began to extend his photographic repertoire beyond the Carinthian region. In 1885 he made his first important trip, to Greece, which would be followed by those to Palestine and Egypt, North Africa, Turkey, Syria, France, Belgium, Spain and Italy, as well as shorter trips to various parts of the Austrian Empire. Hungarian. The catalog of images in his studio came to offer 20.000 landscape images, an impressive amount for those years. Images that he sold everywhere, also thanks to a network of correspondents throughout Europe.
The photographic collection of Alois Beer, preserved in the Kriegsarchiv in Vienna, includes over 30.000 plates belonging to the photographer and present in his sales catalogue, published in 1910 and integrated in 1914.
Alto Garda Museum - Riva del Garda
Piazza C. Battisti, 3/A – 38066 Riva del Garda
until November 3 2013
