Fotoreproductie van een tekening van een uitbarsting van de Vesuvius in 1861 c. 1860 - 1880

This is Giorgio Sommer's 1861 photomechanical reproduction of an erupting Mount Vesuvius, housed here at the Rijksmuseum. The composition organizes itself into clear horizontal registers. The base of the image is a rocky foreground with indistinct figures, then a flat expanse of water which meets the central motif of the volcano, Vesuvius, capped with a plume of smoke. Sommer’s use of the stereoscopic format is intriguing here. This choice emphasizes not just the visual spectacle of the eruption, but also the conceptual framework through which such events are understood. By reproducing a drawing through photography and then duplicating it in stereo, Sommer intervenes in our perception. Ultimately, Sommer's work uses formal repetition to draw attention to the constructed nature of viewing. What is real, what is representation, and how do our modes of seeing shape our understanding of an event?