29 Facts About Felice Beato

Felice Beato was one of the first people to take photographs in East Asia and one of the first war photographers.

Felice Beato is noted for his genre works, portraits, and views and panoramas of the architecture and landscapes of Asia and the Mediterranean region.

Felice Beato's travels gave him opportunities to create images of countries, people, and events that were unfamiliar and remote to most people in Europe and North America.

Felice Beato's work provides images of such events as the Indian Rebellion of 1857 and the Second Opium War, and represents the first substantial body of photojournalism.

Felice Beato influenced other photographers; and his impact in Japan, where he taught and worked with numerous other photographers and artists, was particularly deep and lasting.

Felice Beato probably met the British photographer James Robertson in Malta in 1850 and accompanied him to Constantinople in 1851.

Felice Beato had been an engraver at the Imperial Ottoman Mint since 1843 and had probably taken up photography in the 1840s.

Felice Beato was ostensibly Robertson's assistant the unpredictable conditions of a war zone forced Felice Beato to assume a more active role.

In February 1858 Felice Beato arrived in Calcutta and began travelling throughout Northern India to document the aftermath of the Indian Rebellion of 1857.

Felice Beato was in the cities of Delhi, Cawnpore, Meerut, Benares, Amritsar, Agra, Simla, and Lahore.

Felice Beato was joined in July 1858 by his brother Antonio, who later left India, probably for health reasons, in December 1859.

Felice Beato was sent from India to photograph the Anglo-French military expedition to China in the Second Opium War.

Felice Beato's photographs are some of the earliest taken in China.

Signor Felice Beato was here in great excitement, characterising the group as "beautiful," and begging that it might not be interfered with until perpetuated by his photographic apparatus, which was done a few minutes afterwards.

Just outside Peking, Felice Beato took photographs at Qingyi Yuan, a private estate of the Emperor of China comprising palace pavilions, temples, a large artificial lake, and gardens.

Felice Beato returned to England in October 1861, and during that winter he sold 400 of his photographs of India and China to Henry Hering, a London commercial portrait photographer.

Felice Beato's images are remarkable not only for their quality but for their rarity as photographic views of Edo period Japan.

Many of the photographs in Felice Beato's albums were hand-coloured, a technique that in his studio successfully applied the refined skills of Japanese watercolourists and woodblock printmakers to European photography.

Felice Beato photographed with Ueno Hikoma, and possibly taught photography to Raimund von Stillfried.

In 1871 Felice Beato served as official photographer with the United States naval expedition of Admiral Rodgers to Korea.

Felice Beato owned land and several studios, was a property consultant, had a financial interest in the Grand Hotel of Yokohama, and was a dealer in imported carpets and women's bags, among other things.

Felice Beato appeared in court on several occasions, variously as plaintiff, defendant, and witness.

On 6 August 1873 Felice Beato was appointed Consul General for Greece in Japan.

Briefly back in England in 1886, Felice Beato lectured to the London and Provincial Photographic Society on photographic techniques.

Felice Beato arrived in Burma probably in December 1886, after Upper Burma had been annexed by the British in late 1885.

Felice Beato, who had covered military operations in India and China, was probably attracted by the news of the annexation.

Felice Beato set up a photographic studio in Mandalay and, in 1894, a curiosa and antiques dealership, running both businesses separately and, according to records at the time, very successfully.

Felice Beato predominantly produced albumen silver prints from wet collodion glass-plate negatives.

Felice Beato pioneered and refined the techniques of hand-colouring photographs and making panoramas.