Photographs

An “exceedingly uncommon” signed and inscribed photograph of the German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche (1844-1900) earned top-lot honours in an Autographs sale held at Swann.

A rare photograph of the poet and playwright Oscar Wilde taken during his time at Magdalen College, Oxford sold for £4200 (plus 22% buyer’s premium) at a Dominic Winter auction.

On a hot afternoon in 2000, as part of his broader exploration of marginalised communities, Italian photographer Marco Delogu (b.1960) visited a Roma camp on the outskirts of Rome.

Galerie Negropontes has turned to photography to explore the work of another canonical artist.

This splendid image depicts Horace Brown, a former president of the Piscatorial Society.

Portrait of actress who mesmerised Hitchcock makes highest sum for the artist since 2020

Books from a routine call proved disappointing until a first edition Dracula loomed into view

For followers of rock stars, style icons, actors and actresses, opportunities abound to acquire signed photographs of some of the famous cultural figures of the 20th century.

Compared with Scandinavian exploration by illustrious figures such as Nansen and Amundsen, the Vega Expedition is little known outside the region.

A rare surviving group of unseen early aviation photographs documenting the pioneering long-distance flights of Italian pilot Carlo Francesco ‘Francis’ Lombardi (1897-1983) was offered at Roseberys (26/25/20% buyer’s premium) in south London on March 11.

The Oscar Wilde Collection formed over 60 years by bibliophile and former dealer in Oriental antiques Jeremy Mason prompted collectors to come out in force and was 100% sold at Bonhams (28/27% buyer’s premium) in Knightsbridge.

Described as “a remarkable convergence of Victorian social history and 20th century musical heritage”, a gelatin silver print of the Wiltshire thatcher Lot Long sold for £16,000 (plus 20% buyer’s premium) at Denhams in Warnham, West Sussex on February 25.

Few photographers were as explicit about the purpose of their work as Gordon Parks (1912-2006), who in 1967 described the camera as his “choice of weapon” against racism, discrimination and poverty.

This ambrotype of a California Gold Rush town sold for £1500, six times the top estimate, as part of the Winter Fine Sale at Hartleys (20% buyer’s premium) in Ilkley on November 26.

As he died more than a decade before the medium really took off, very few photographs of the American author Edgar Allan Poe (1809-49) exist.