Background
Giorgio Sommer was born on September 2, 1834, in Frankfurt Am Main, Bayern, Germany.
Giorgio Sommer was born on September 2, 1834, in Frankfurt Am Main, Bayern, Germany.
After studying business in Frankfurt, Giorgio Sommer opened his first photography studio in Switzerland, where he made relief images of mountains for the Swiss government.
Giorgio Sommer began his photography career in Switzerland, producing a series of pictures documenting the feasibility of opening new roads. In about 1860 he went into business with the German photographer Edmund Behles in Rome.
The next year Giorgio Sommer photographed the battle camps and forts of Gaeta after the siege, and documented, for the regional government, the suppression of highway robbers in the provinces. In 1873 he produced a catalog of landscapes taken from the Alps to Malta, one of the most nearly complete works of the time.
Giorgio Sommer worked in all the popular formats of his day: carte de visite, stereoview, and large albumen prints (approximately 8x10) which were sold individually and in bound albums.
The partnership with Behles ended in 1874, after which each photographer continued his own business. In Naples, Giorgio Sommer opened a total of four additional studios: at No. 4 and No. 8 Monte di Dio, No. 5 Magazzino S. Caterina, and a last at Piazza della Vittoria.