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and then photographed famous scenes and settlements
of Transylvania. He formulated an experimental method
of producing photoceramics, and from then on, he made
several hundreds of them in his studio. He experimented
with colour photography for decades, from 1866 until
his death in 1916, and left behind hundreds of coloured
paper-prints, also called heliochroms.
Two very important studios were established during
the decade of the 1860s: the fi rst was of Ede Kozics’
in Pozsony, which is presently Bratislava in Slovakia,
and the other was Gondy and Egey’s in Debrecen.
Photographic dynasties evolved all over the country. In
addition to the Strelisky studio in Pest (founded in 1843)
was the Knebel family’s studio located in Szombathely,
Langsfelds’ was in Kaposvár, and the Divald family’s
studios were in located throughout towns in Upper
Northern Hungary (Felvidék) and appeared later in the
capital as well.
György Klösz is considered to be one of the most
signifi cant photographers of the 19th century. His pic-
tures depict Budapest’s last third of the century and its
evolution into a metropolis. Also interresting are his
photographs which illustrate the conditions preceding
these changes. In the last years of the century Klösz
systematically photographed the castles of the aristoc-
racy, and took shots of the exterior of the buildings. He
also photographed scenes of representation and more
intimate, private life in addition to the well-kept and
diverse castle parks, thus leaving exceptional treasu-
res and unique documents of aristocratic ways-of-life
for posterity. In 1879, he recorded the catastrophy of
Szeged, which was destroyed by the fl ood of the river
Tisza. Klösz took shots from a boat using large collodion
glass plates to document this tragedy.
Károly Divald faced dangerous situations on the mo-
untain paths of Tatra when he photographed the beautiful
views of the mountain between 1860 and 1880. He too
worked with collodion wet plates.
Balázs Orbán wandered all over Székely Land (Ea-
stern Transylvania) between 1862 and 1868, taking
photographs of the scenery and the inhabitants.
Chromotypes were treasured and were rare pho-
tographs. Only the well-equipped studios were able to
produce them. Amonst the qulifi es studios were that of
Lipót Strelisky, Ignác Schrecker, Doctor and Kozmata,
Ede Ellinger and his brother, István Goszleth, József
Heller, Emil Keglovich, Károly Koller, Ferenc Kozmata,
Ede Kozics, and László Naschitz.
The works of Hungarian photographers have won a
number of honourable mentions and awards at foreign
exhibitions, for example Lipót Strelisky received Men-
tion Honorable for his chromotype at the 1867 World
Exhibition in Paris. Also, at the 1900 World Exhibition
in Paris his son, Sándor won the Grand Prix for his
composit photograph titled “Csárdás,” which was put
together from photographs of signifi cant actors of the
time. Jakab Marastoni was the fi rst to present his da-
guerreotypes at a Hungarian exhibition, which consisted
of 20 photographs in 1842. Lipót Strelisky displayed
two daguerreotypes at the exhibition of Pesti Müegylet
(Society for Supporting Art) in 1846. Photography
however, was met with really great success at the Hun-
garian General Exhibition of Budapest in 1885 and at
the Millennial Exhibition in 1896.
In 1890 an exhibition of amateur photographers’
works was organised in Budapest. Amongst those ama-
teurs were some aristocratic photographers as well, like
count Mihály Esterházy. Hungary’s most famous aris-
tocratic amateur photographer however, was archducess
Isabelle who was of Belgian decent, but through her
marriage she became member of the Hapsburg family
and of the Hungarian aristocracy. Her photographs de-
pict her family-members, their forms of entertainment,
the agricultural works on their vast estates, the people of
these lands, and the beautiful natural environment too. In
her legacy both large (21 × 27 cm) glass negatives and
contact copies of the period platinotypes are found.
Several Hungarian expeditions reached exotic places
of the world and took photographs of rare occurences.
After Pál Rosti, János Xantus travelled to Southeast Asia
and Japan in 1869. An expedition led by Sámuel Teleki
travelled to Africa between 1886 and 1889, during which
the leader and one of the members, Lajos Höhner took
photographs. The expeditions of Jenö Zichy in 1895,
1896 and 1898, sought traces of Hungarian prehistory,
photographing the regions and the peoples of Caucasus
and Central Asia. Mór Déchy chose the Himalayas
(1877) and Caucasus (1884–1902), and count Rudolf
Festetics targeted the islands of Oceania for scientifi c
study and photography. The untiring globe-trotter and art
collector Ferenc Hopp, while travelling round the world
fi ve times between 1882 and 1913, also photographed
exotic spots.
Many of the photographers dealt with photomecha-
nical duplication, the fi rst if which was Károly Divald,
then Ferenc Kozmata, Antal Weinwurm and last György
Klösz.
At the end of the 19th century, photography was
drawn into public administration, in the form of photo
identifi cation papers, and in criminal records—par-
ticularly in 1898 when photo albums were compiled
of pictures of ’subversive elements’ who were banned
from Budapestand, and given to major police stations
for idintifi cation. Photography also became important to
the sciences, equally used for ethnography, medicine and
astronomy (in the latter fi eld the names of Jenö Gothard
and Miklós Konkoly-Thege should be noted).
From the 1890s a new group of private photographers
joined the professional and amateur photographers. The-
se new phtoographers were emplyed by the intelligentsia