[Senses] [Underwood & Underwood]
The Five Senses. Set of stereographic photographs
Set of five pairs of stereographic photographs, each illustrating one of the five senses and, at the same time, telling a story. By Underwood & Underwood Publishers, New York, London, Toronto-Canada, Ottawa-Kansas, 1905. Each pair of photographs mounted to solid, concave cardboard plate to be inserted in a stereoscopic viewer (viewer not included). 3.5 x 7 inches (8.8 x 17.8 cm). In very fine condition. The sequence:1. Seeing. A boy in a bourgeois household ogles a sumptuous fruit basket on a table.
2. Smelling. The boy gets close to the basket to smell the fruit.
3. Tasting. The boy eats the fruit (and has already finished half of the basket); incidentally, he is overweight.
4. Hearing. The boy listens and hears his mother approaching, who emerges from behind a curtain.
5. Feeling. The boy get a beating from his mother, with the remnants of the meal in the background.
Underwood & Underwood was the company of the two brothers Elmer (1859–1947) and Bert Elias Underwood (1862–1947). Founded in Ottawa, Kansas, in 1881, the company moved to New York in 1887 and grew to become the world's largest producer of stereoscopic photographs. "Frequently the images [by Underwood & Underwood] were arranged as continuous narratives that were intended to educate the viewer, and children in particular, in an impressive manner on the causes and effects of 'sinful behavior' such as alcoholism, sexual temptation, adultery or theft. This was done in part by surprisingly drastic imagery, such are scenarios with drunken children inhabiting shabby abodes." (After German Wikipedia) The present series is a good illustration of these nineteenth-century didactics. (22290)
Ephemera Photography