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Two original glossy photos of artistic portraits of Albert Einstein by German artist Elsa Schmid, including a 7.75 x 9.5 photo of a drawing of Einstein in mixed media, and a 7.75 x 9.75 photo of the same pose accomplished as a mosaic, which was Schmid’s specialty. The reverse of both photos bears a John D. Schiff photography stamp. In overall fine condition.
Accompanied by a copy of a 1945 typed letter from Albert Einstein expressing his thanks and admiration to Schmid, which reads: “The viewing of your mosaic portrait has been an aesthetic experience I shall never forget. I am happy in the thought that my mere existence has provided the occasion for the creation of such a work. The picture gives perfect expression to those traits which are almost completely absent in modern man—inward perception and contemplation, detachment from the here and now. It remains a puzzle to me how it is possible to achieve with such intractable material these delicate and yet powerful effects.”
Elsa Schmid (1897-1970) was an accomplished German artist of many mediums, best known for her mosaic and glass work. In her youth, she spent many summers at an artists' colony in the Italian hill town of Anticoli Corrado, learning mosaics, painting, and art history. After immigrating to the United States in the 1920s, Schmid’s experimental mosaic technique, laying stones in the sand ground face-up, caught the attention of the art world and beyond. In the 1940s, she began teaching the craft to Albert Einstein’s stepdaughter, Margot, and soon became close friends with the famed physicist. Schmid’s work is held in several prominent collections, including those of the Museum of Modern Art in New York and the Harvard Art Museums in Cambridge.
John D. Schiff (1907-1976) was a noted photographer born as Hans Schiff in Cologne, Germany. He learned photography and took photos for several Jewish organizations, but worked primarily in his father’s company as a traveling salesman. He escaped Nazi Germany and fled to England in 1939 and then immigrated to the United States, where he started working as a freelance commercial photographer, specializing in the depiction of artwork on location for art dealers and artists, including Pablo Picasso, Andy Warhol, and Marcel Duchamp.
