Kolekcja | 25.09.2015 The sometimes used name of this item comes from the French tourniquet (literally: wheel of fortune). In the vernacular it denotes revolving doors, usually composed of at least four wings spinning around a single axis. Owing to a similar technical solution, this term was used to describe all items with an analogous construction, such as a revolving book shelf, a newspaper hold, etc. The Wilanów exhibit was purchased in 1963, and from that time it is used for displaying photographs of persons associated with the palace, mainly members of the Potocki family.
The first information about the invention of photography reached Poland at the beginning of 1839, and already in October J. Fraget, a maker of plate, announced that he had brought from Paris a complete daguerreotype. In 1845 Karol Beyer opened in Warsaw the first daguerreotype studio, later transformed into a photographic atelier. Interestingly, in 1856 Beyer took magnificent photographs of monuments lent by the Potocki family for an “Exhibition of antiquities and objets d’art” on show in the Warsaw palace belonging to August Potocki, thus inaugurating professional photographic documentation of historical monuments in Poland.
Joanna Paprocka-Gajek