About the Hub

  • Box of normal, white, glossy, single-weight Sunotyp S 301 gaslight paper. c. 1930s. Manufactured by Mimosa, AG, in Dresden. 100 sheets, 6.5 x 9.5 cm (2 1/2 x 3 3/4"). Collection Alison Rossiter

    Well known in the nineteenth century as a manufacturing center for albumin and collodion papers, in the twentieth century Dresden was primarily recognized for its optics and photographic camera equipment. The companies Mimosa AG, Vereinigte Fabriken Photographischer Papiere AG, and Zeiss Ikon were all headquartered in Dresden, a hub of art and music and a gateway to Russia, Czechoslovakia, and Poland. Accessible by one of the first modern railways (the Dresden-Leipzig corridor, established around 1849), the city also had direct lines to Berlin and Nuremberg and other terminal tracks coming in from the West. The clean water needed for the manufacturing process was available in ample supply, as were the chicken egg whites needed to make albumin paper. The availability of this ingredient, a by-product of the many pasta factories in and around Dresden in the mid-nineteenth century, was likely a decisive factor in the choice of the city as a location for photochemical companies, which went on to produce photographic paper of all kinds and of excellent quality. Their success attracted many other firms to Dresden. 

    —Lee Ann Daffner

Manufacturers

  • 1913–45
    Mimosa Akt.-Ges. paper manufacturer
  • 1926–72
    Zeiss Ikon AG camera manufacturer
  • 1909–26
    Internationale Camera Akt.-Ges. (ICA)

Walther Artists Who Used These Products

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