Name of Object:

A Turkish Coffee-House, Constantinople

Location:

London, United Kingdom

Holding Institution:

Victoria and Albert Museum

 About Victoria and Albert Museum, London

Date of Object:

1854

Inventory Number:

SD 824

Provenance:

Turkey

Description:

Preziosi was of noble Maltese birth, but against the wishes of his family rejected their chosen profession of the law to become an artist. From 1842, until his death forty years later, he lived and worked in Istanbul, renowned for his vibrant and evocative images of all the different races and cultures of that most cosmopolitan of cities. He became for a time well-known in Western Europe because many travellers, (including in 1869 the Prince of Wales) took his pictures home as souvenirs of their visit. Demand for his work prompted the publication in Paris in 1858 of a series of lithographs, Stamboul Recollections of Eastern Life.This is a fine example of Preziosi’s keen observation of contemporary Ottoman life, rapidly sketched yet full of accurately depicted detail.

Type of Object

Watercolour

Citation of this web page:

Victoria and Albert Museum "A Turkish Coffee-House, Constantinople" in "Sharing History", Museum With No Frontiers, 2026.
https://sharinghistory.museumwnf.org/database_item.php?id=object;AWE;uk;90;en

Prepared by: Victoria and Albert Museum

MWNF Working Number: UK 090