MELLING

VUE DE LA PLACE ET DE LA FONTAINE DE TOP-HANE

MELLING, Antoine Ignace (1763-1831).

Paris: P. Didot l’ainé, 1809-1819. Etching with engraving by le Rouge, Pillement, and Née after Melling, with later, professional hand-colouring. Proof before title. Very good condition…

69 X 47 cm., framed

A fine view of the Tophane Place, Tophane fountain and behind Kılıç Ali Paşa Mosque from Melling’s grand work ‘Voyage Pittoresque de
Constantinople et des rives du Bosphore’.

Born in Lorraine in 1763, Antoine Ignace Melling, artist and voyager, was trained in architecture and painting. At the age of 19, he went to Constantinople as part of the Russian Ambassador’s retinue. After successfully completing several commissions for Hatice Sultan, the sister of Selim III, which included the renovation of her palace at Ortakoy, Melling was employed as the Sultan’s architect in 1795. His position as royal architect gave him a privileged opportunity to observe the Ottoman court, and during his eighteen years there, he made many detailed drawings of the sultan’s palaces, Ottoman society, and Constantinople and its environs.
Within a year of returning to Paris in 1803, Melling published a prospectus for the ‘Voyage pittoresque’, the first thirteen livraisons of which were published in 1809. He mcompleted the engravings for this work in 1819.