Jewish photographer: Eduard Isaac Asser pioneer of photography

Eduard Isaac Asser pioneer of photography

Eduard Isaac Asser was the son of a famous jurist from Holland. He studied law in Amsterdam to follow in his father’s footsteps. But a great lover of art, he first tried his hand at the daguerreotype. Passing through Paris several times, he started to work in photograpy and to deepen his knowledge of the techniques of this new plastic expression.

With the help of technical books in French, dangerous chemicals, printing papers prepared by himself, he patiently produced his first photos. In 1857, he developed a photolithography process that made it possible to produce inexpensive photos. He patented this technique called the “Asser process” and it was a major factor in his fame and success at the time.

Like many pioneers of photography, Eduard Isaac Asser primarily makes portraits of his family and friends. He then moved on to self-portraits, still lifes and cityscapes in the spirit of the great 17th century Dutch painting, while revisiting the great pictorial genres, his photos are of historical interest and we owe him the oldest photographs of his city. On the one hand, his photographs are of historical interest and he is the author of the oldest photographs of his city. Without knowing it, the Dutchman is already paving the way to an original mastery of the photographic language.