Electrotype replicas

“Electrotype Replicas” is an essay for the catalogue Lawrence Alma-Tadema: At Home In Antiquity (Prestel, Munich, London, New York, 2016, pp. 114-115), which accompanies a major new touring exhibition of paintings by Alma-Tadema (1836-1912). It opens at the Fries Museum in Leeuwarden, Holland from 1 October 2016 to 7 February 2017 and then visits the Österreichische Galerie Belvedere in Vienna, and concludes at Leighton House Museum in London. The book has been translated and published in English, German and Dutch editions. The essay analyses Alma-Tadema’s personal collection and display of electrotypes of artworks from Ancient Rome at his London home, and his use of electrotypes as ‘props’ in some of his most famous paintings. It focuses on an electrotype replica of the famous Roman krater (oxybaphon) that forms part of the Hildesheim Treasure in Hanover, Germany unearthed in 1868, and details how the electrotype owned by Alma-Tadema was made by the French electroplating firm Christofle et Cie.