BRAUN, Adolphe - Ein europäisches Photographie-Unternehmen

"The Alsace-based family business Braun & Cie was one of the most pioneering and productive 19th-century photography companies with a wide range of products marketed throughout Europe and North America: flower still lifes, Alpine landscapes, Swiss cities, animal and architecture studies, and the reproduction of famous works of art. (...)

From 1860, he and his more than 40 employees photographed the Alpine landscapes and cities of Switzerland with large-format cameras - Gustave COURBET occasionally used the photographs as templates for paintings. In addition to animal studies, architectural and landscape depictions, BRAUN increasingly concentrated on the reproduction of works of art.

During the Franco-Prussian War (1870-1871) Adolphe BRAUN photographed numerous destructions, especially in Paris and Belfort or on bridges. Not only did he document war damage, pictures of ruins were also commercially viable.
Later, he documented the construction of the Gotthard Railway and the Gotthard Vertex Tunnel, both of which were completed and commissioned only five years after his death; For three decades he was the first official photographer of the Louvre." (partly free translated publisher's note, © Schirmer / Mosel, 2017)