Object of the month

Grimatiscope | Photography – Art & Humour

October 2024

DISTORTER FOR C.V. PHOTOGRAPHS/PORTRAITS. – FOR CARICATURE PURPOSES.

Manufacture:
Louis Jules Duboscq (1817-1886). Patent J.D.
Dating:
1869
Dimensions:
13,5x13,5x15,5 cm.
Inscribed:
J.D. BREVET - S.G.D.G
Type of object:
Mechanical viewfinder, with spring-loaded, wind-up motor and movable lenses.
Technique:
Anamorphic distortions on the basis of a photographic capture already made.
Material:
Wood, steel/metal gears, glass sconces, composite lenses for distortion and mobiles.
Property:
FBS Collection.

It is a hardwood box, recessed in all its sides, except for the front where it has two eyepieces with lenses and four glass trims, one at each vertex, to cover the closing screws of its four corners. On the back there is a rectangular opening at the bottom through which a photograph of the same size or smaller than the C.V. is inserted. It is protected by a frosted glass that acts as a closure and light diffuser. The shape of the viewer is ergonomic, with a body similar to that of stereoscopic viewers.

As we see the front of the Grimatiscope, to the right is the closing and opening cylinder of the mobile mechanism. At the base of the device is the hole for the key with which the springs that move the lenses are wound. Each lens moves differently, so two different distorted and changing images are obtained, since there is a result in each moving eyepiece, even though both are modifying the same photograph.

Taking into account that its designer/manufacturer, the Frenchman Jules Duboscq, learned the optical trade in the company of what would be his father-in-law, Jean-Baptiste Francois Soleil (1798-1878), and with whom he associated, forming his own business division in 1849 (called Duboscq Pellin), this invention belongs to the intermediate phase of his professional development.

Knowing the phase in which the invention materialized allows us to place it in a specific moment of social evolution, in which photography was being used commercially to produce reliable, but distorted, images of individuals in order to be used directly, or as inspiration, to generate drawings and caricatures.

Since humor and laughter have been considered, since before history was captured in books, as a potential danger, leading to prohibition. We believe that October can be a good month so that, on an annual basis, we have a reminder of how healthy it is to laugh with everyone, and also at ourselves.

Contemporary living writers, living such as Terry Eagleton (1943), deceased, such as the philosopher Henri Bergson (1859-1941), as well as those who have written to us since ancient times (Plato, Aristotle,…), have dealt with humor and laughter.

A famous photographer such as the Frenchman Nadar (Gaspar Félix Tournachon, 1820 – 1910) was a caricaturist.

Other photographers, such as the Spanish Carlos Íñigo y Gorostiza (1863-1925), were also caricaturists; In this last case, in addition, he was naval attaché of the Spanish Embassy in Tokyo (1895?-1897); as a photographer and caricaturist, he collected the interpretations that we see, and will show in later installments, of some of the photographers he knew with whom that he treated and whose hobbies and photographic specialty he introduced as an element within the caricature.

Our criterion is that humor and laughter are very healthy and, from that constructive perspective, photography in the 19th century provided another way of “focusing” on humorous caricatures, which endure to this day.

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