Via delle Tombe (de Weg van de Tombes) in Pompeï 1861 - 1878

This stereo card of the Via delle Tombe in Pompeii was made by Ernest Eléonor Pierre Lamy. Stereo cards like this one were very popular at the time and made in two stages: first, a special camera with two lenses would take two nearly identical photographs simultaneously. Once printed, the card would then be viewed using a special device which, like the camera, also had two lenses. The visual effect is that of a single three-dimensional image. The popularity of stereo cards was due to the advent of new photographic techniques, but also to the advent of mass tourism. This new market fed a demand for views of distant places, in a way that was much more immediate than prints or drawings. The mass production of stereo cards created a flattened experience of place, yet at the same time, the illusion of depth, a novel form of presence.