The Braun-Epstein Collection

The Braun-Epstein Collection comprises more than 7,800 photographs from the 19th and early 20th centuries, created by over 250 photographers and studios worldwide. It offers a vivid record of the thriving trade in travel imagery, purchased by people who wanted to remember their journeys, or experience distant places without ever leaving home. As leisure travel expanded with the rise of the middle class, so too did the popularity of “armchair tourism.” Photographs of landmarks such as the Taj Mahal, the Acropolis, or the canals of Venice were sold alongside other city views, landscapes, portraits, and reproductions of artworks. Bound albums and folios in the collection focus on places across Europe, Asia, Africa, and the Americas. The photographs’ captions often reveal how geography and language have shifted over time, and some provide evidence of the 19th-century fascination with exoticism, reflecting the history and cultural attitudes of colonialism. The collection includes work by many prominent studios—Alinari, Beato, Bourne, Ferrez, and Nadar among them—and features a range of processes from albumen prints and photochromes to salted paper and carbon prints. Acquired from Parisian flea markets between the 1950s and 1970s by American artist David Hill (1914-1977), the photographs were later preserved by Canadian photo-historian Marta Braun and photography dealer Edward Epstein. Today, the Braun-Epstein Collection is an extraordinary resource for students, scholars, and the public, illuminating the intertwined histories of photography, tourism, and cultural imagination.

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A sepia-toned photo showing two black men seated on two camels in a desert landscape. The person in the lead is wearing loose pants and top, while the person in the back is shirtless and draped in a loose fabric from the waist down. — Fig.
Jean Pascal Sébah, [Bisharin Camels], 1893, albumen print. The Image Centre. Gift of Marta Braun and Edward Epstein, 2023

Fig.
EDITION PHOTOGLOB. Zürich, [Climbing a Pyramid, Egypt], ca. 1890, collotype. The Image Centre. Gift of Marta Braun and Edward Epstein, 2023

Rice planters in a field in Java, Indonesia — Fig.
Unidentified photographer, [Rice planting in Java, Indonesia], ca. 1900, albumen print. The Image Centre. Gift of Marta Braun and Edward Epstein, 2023

Two people spinning silk in Japan — Fig.
Unidentified photographer, [Spinning Silk, Japan], ca. 1889, albumen print. The Image Centre. Gift of Marta Braun and Edward Epstein, 2023

A seated woman has her hair done by another standing woman in Japan. — Fig.
Aldolfo Fasari, [Hair Dressing, Japan], ca. 1880, albumen print. The Image Centre. Gift of Marta Braun and Edward Epstein, 2023

Colour photograph of an ornate temple in Japan — Fig.
Unidentified photographer, The Holy Water Cistern, Nikko, Japan, ca. 1880, albumen print. The Image Centre. Gift of Marta Braun and Edward Epstein, 2023

Fig.
Unidentified photographer, [View of the Moulin de la Galette façade, Paris, France], ca. 1900, collodion print. The Image Centre. Gift of Marta Braun and Edward Epstein, 2023

Two people in front of an acropolis in Corinth, Greece. The acropolis is located in a grassy field, with a mountain in the background. — Fig.
B.C.C., [Acropolis in Corinth, Greece], ca. 1875, albumen print. The Image Centre. Gift of Marta Braun and Edward Epstein, 2023

A dipytch of two buildings in Pisa, Italy. — Fig.
Unidentified photographer, [Left: Baptistry of Pisa; Right: The Leaning Tower of Pisa], ca. 1875, albumen print. The Image Centre. Gift of Marta Braun and Edward Epstein, 2023

An oyster merchant pictured at a booth showcasing his wares. A number of other men and boys are pictured around the booth looking into the camera — Fig.
Fratelli Alinari, [An Oyster merchant in Santa Lucia, Naples, Italy], ca. 1895, albumen print. The Image Centre. Gift of Marta Braun and Edward Epstein, 2023

Fig.
Giovanni Battista Brusa, [Gondoliers travelling in front of a view of Venice, Italy], ca. 1870, albumen print. The Image Centre. Gift of Marta Braun and Edward Epstein, 2023

A colour photograph showcasing the houses and streets and coastal landscape of Tenerife, Spain. — Fig.
Unidentified photographer, [Marina, Santa Cruz, Tenerife, Spain], ca. 1890, photochrom. The Image Centre. Gift of Marta Braun and Edward Epstein, 2023

Landscape of Swiss mountain pass and a hotel in the foreground. — Fig.
SCHROEDER & Cie., [Hotel Eiger & Mönchs, Little Scheidegg mountain pass, Lauterbrunnen, Switzerland], ca. 1900, albumen print. The Image Centre. Gift of Marta Braun and Edward Epstein, 2023

A 19th century street scene in London England, with horse drawn wagons and people — Fig.
George Washington Wilson, Regent Circus, Oxford Street, London, England, ca. 1885, albumen print. The Image Centre. Gift of Marta Braun and Edward Epstein, 2023

A cable car pictured in a mountainous landscape — Fig.
Jules-Eugène Auclair, [The cable car at Pic du Midi d'Ossau mountain, France], ca. 1930, gelatin silver print. The Image Centre. Gift of Marta Braun and Edward Epstein, 2023

A colour photograph of a castle atop a treed hillside overlooking a village — Fig.
EDITION PHOTOGLOB, Zürich, [Harz Castle, Wernigerode, Germany], ca. 1865, photochrom. The Image Centre. Gift of Marta Braun and Edward Epstein, 2023

A seated man with a bear smokes a hookah by a rock wall. — Fig.
Unidentified photographer, [Hookah smoking, Constantinople, now Istanbul], ca. 1875, albumen print. The Image Centre. Gift of Marta Braun and Edward Epstein, 2023

A scene of bathers in a Turkish bath — Fig.
Sébah & Joaillier, [Bath of Suleiman the Magnificent, Bursa, Turkey], 1894, albumen print. The Image Centre. Gift of Marta Braun and Edward Epstein, 2023

An ornate gate on a street with people and wooden structures on the right. — Fig.
Sébah & Joaillier, [Imarethane Gate near Hagia Sophia, Istanbul], ca. 1890, albumen print. The Image Centre. Gift of Marta Braun and Edward Epstein, 2023

The photograph captures a bustling waterfront scene in Istanbul, centered around the Yeni Cami (New Mosque), a prominent Ottoman imperial mosque located in the Eminönü district near the Golden Horn.

In the foreground, the quay is crowded with small wooden rowboats and fishing vessels, some filled with goods, possibly fish or textiles. People are actively loading, unloading, or navigating the crowded shoreline, indicating a lively commercial hub or market area.

Behind the waterfront, a densely packed collection of Ottoman-era buildings leads the eye upward toward the monumental Yeni Mosque, with its grand central dome, semi-domes, and twin minarets rising into the sky. The mosque dominates the skyline and serves as both a religious and architectural focal point.

The photograph is sepia-toned and mounted on a white border, typical of late 19th-century albumen prints, and bears the studio mark: “Abdullah Frères, 663” in the bottom left, and
“Mosquée de Yeni-Djami” in the bottom right. — Fig.
Abdullah Frères [Mosque of Yéni-Dajami, Istanbul, Turkey], ca. 1880, albumen print. The Image Centre. Gift of Marta Braun and Edward Epstein, 2023

The photograph captures a serene yet powerful view of Niagara Falls, taken from the American side. The central figure in the image is a man in a dark suit and bowler hat, seated on a rock near the edge of the water. He faces the cascading falls, absorbed in the natural spectacle unfolding before him.

The waterfall is rendered in a soft blur, evoking the immense motion and mist of the crashing water. A long exposure technique has likely been used, lending a ghostly, ethereal quality to the rushing water. Spray rises from the falls, catching the light and creating a hazy, almost dreamlike effect.

The surrounding landscape is rugged and natural: rocky shoreline in the foreground, leafless branches to the right, and a tree-covered ridge in the distance on the left. The horizon is marked by the lip of the falls and low-lying structures or trees barely visible through the mist. — Fig.
Unidentified photographer, [Niagara Falls, view from the American side, Buffalo, New York], ca. 1860, albumen print. The Image Centre. Gift of Marta Braun and Edward Epstein, 2023.

The composition showcases the awe-inspiring cliffs of Glacier Point, with a single figure standing boldly on the edge of a massive granite outcrop. Dressed in dark clothing and a hat, the person gazes out over the expansive Yosemite Valley, dwarfed by the immensity of the surrounding terrain.

In the background, the iconic Half Dome rises majestically, its sheer face glowing faintly in the distance. The vertical format of the photograph accentuates the dramatic elevation and vertical drop of the cliff, evoking a sense of both wonder and vertigo.

To the right of the figure, another person is crouched, possibly preparing camera equipment—suggesting a moment of exploration or early landscape documentation. The photo powerfully conveys themes of human scale against nature’s grandeur, a hallmark of early Western landscape photography. — Fig.
Isaiah West Taber, [Half Dome, 5,000 ft. and Glacier Point, Yosemite Park, California], ca. 1880, albumen print. The Image Centre. Gift of Marta Braun and Edward Epstein, 2023