Gabriel Lory fils Oberhasli, Bern, Switzerland

Memories of Switzerland 1853

This picture forms part of a collection of mid-19th century works that we have for sale relating to Switzerland. The pictures were collected by 'Marie und Heinrich' as souvenirs of a trip to Switzerland in 1853. The couple are unidentified but writing accompanying the collection is in German, French and English, suggesting that Marie und Heinrich could indeed be Marie et Henri or Mary and Henry. It appears that in 1856 the couple were settled at Montmirail on the outskirts of Paris.

The pictures in the collection are evidence of the Romantic 19th-century appreciation of the Swiss landscape and its mythology. For Lord Byron, Switzerland was ‘the most Romantic region in the world’; throughout the late 18th and early 19th centuries, the country became a place of pilgrimage for poets and painters from all over Europe, seeking to experience for themselves the vertiginous awe inspired by its mountains and the pristine beauty of its lakes.

Furthermore, such pictures not only reflected the country's landmarks, customs and stories, they were instrumental in forming the image of Switzerland in the 19th century. The collection includes two aquatints by Zurich-born artist, watercolourist and art publisher Rudolf Dikenmann (1793–1884), who produced thousands of prints sold to tourists, some of which were hand-coloured by his daughters Anna and Louise, and by his younger brother Johannes. There are two fine aquatints with watercolour by the Swiss landscape painter Gabriel Lory le Fils (1784–1846), which formed part of a lavishly illustrated book of 'Costumes Suisses'. Other regional Swiss costumes in the collection are by Franz Niklaus König (1765–1832), a Swiss painter of genre art and portraits. There are Swiss landscape prints by draughtsman, printmaker and publisher Johann Heinrich Locher (1810–1892) and landscape painter and lithographer Jean-Louis Jacottet (1806–1880). Other subjects of Swiss legend include the Swiss folk hero William Tell, and the sharing of the Milchsuppe at the First War of Kappel (1529), where the two warring armies laid down their arms and peacefully shared a milk soup.

These customs and folklore, as well as an idealisation of the landscape and its people, were key in the 19th century when modern Switzerland was taking shape: leaders were trying to find a common history for this patchwork of a country which would create a sense of national unity and belonging. Associated national values, such as direct democracy, armed neutrality, and the humanitarian tradition, persist today.