A Leica O series original camera from 1923 beats the world record with a selling price of 2,4 million euros during the 32nd Camera Auction at Westlicht on March 10, 2018
Text and Indicated Photos:
José Manuel Serrano Esparza
© jmse
A Leica 0 series original
camera from 1923 in very good cosmetic condition and perfect mechanical working
has beaten the world record with a selling price of 2 million euros during the
32nd Camera Auction at Westlicht on March 10, 2018
© jmse
Aerial front view of the
Leica Null nº 122 of the 25 preproduction series units manufactured in 1923 and
whose aim was to implement a market research prior to the introduction of the
Leica I (Model A) at the Leipzig Spring Fair of 1925.
The dimensions of the
Leica 0 are very similar to the ones featured by the Leica I (Model A) launched into
market two years later and with its body also covered in vulcanite.
Top area of the Leica 0
Number 122 from 1923 showing from left to right as seen in the image: the
exposure counter
with the winding knob on it, the mushroom type shutter release
button, the shutter speed dial (1/25-1/500 plus Z),
the folding viewfinder, the accessory shoe
and the back winding knob.
This camera belonged to
the gorgeous collection of Jim Jannard, a well-known designer and businessman,
creator of Oakley, Inc. (a firm making a comprehensive range of apparel and
googles for motorcycling and skiing) and founder of Red Digital Cinema Camera
Company.
© jmse
Lateral left view of the
Leica 0 number 122 with its permanently attached retractable 5 elements in 3
groups Leitz Anastigmat 50 mm f/3.5 lens designed by Professor Max Berek in
Wetzlar (Germany).
© jmse
Detail of the lens cap
linked to the camera with a very thin string. It has likewise been preserved in
an amazing very good condition, in spite of the 95 years elapsed since this
camera was made.
This cap had to be placed
in front of the lens before advancing each frame.
© jmse
Front view of the Leica 0
with its Leitz Anastigmat 50 mm f/3.5 lens. The exceedingly beautiful design
and posh contours hark back to the mythical Leica Ur from 1914 which
anticipated in nothing less than between 16 and 24 years to breakthrough
shapes, concepts and historically iconic objects and buildings that would mark
the decade of thirties like the Cartier Paris Art Deco Lighter With Watch 1930
made in lacquer on silver and movement manufactured by Watch & Clock
Co.Inc, the Clock Streamline Art Deco designed by Gilbert Rohde for the Herman
Miller Clock Company in 1933 and exhibited during the Chicago World Fair held
that year, the Manchester Express Building incepted by Sir Owen Williams in
1936, the Beolit 39 Bang & Olufsen valve radio from 1938 — - first one made
in bakelite by the firm — , the Marlin Hotel Art Deco in Collins Avenue (Miami)
built by the architect Lawrence Murray Dixon, and many others in 1939.
A conceptual design of
shapes that also foresaw with more than eighty years of anticipation future
profiles and contours of the audiophile and home theatre spheres like the media
center receiver (featuring CD player and AM/FM tuner) of the Bose Lifestyle 12
Home Theatre from 1994 — the first one of the firm — and other subsequent CD
System and DVD System Music Center models; the multiband FM/MW/SW analog
transistor radio Sony ICF-F12S from 2009;
the small personal mobile stereo speaker Orbitsound T3 from 2010 featuring
airSound technology and linkable to iPods, iPhones, portable computers, desktop
computers and handheld videoconsoles; the audio docking system base speaker +
alarm clock ipod/iPhone Sony ICF-DS11iP from 2011 with digital AM/FM tuner and
stereo Megabass sound; the front area of the Unison Research Simply Italy
stereo integrated valve amplifier from 2011 created by Giovanni Maria Sachetti
and made in black colour cherry wood with circular inserts surrounding the dials;
the Bose SoundLink Bluetooth III portable speaker from 2014, and many others.
It all does undoubtedly
prove the amazing prophetic nature and ingenuity of Oskar Barnack, who from the
very beginning laid the foundations for the success of Leica brand with the
Leica Ur from 1914, the Leica 0 prototypes from 1923 and the Leica I from 1925.
©
Westlicht Photographica Auction
Dr. Andreas Kaufmann,
Chairman of the Supervisory Board of Leica Camera A.G, a visionary man whom corresponds the immense historical merit of having saved the legendary German
photographic firm from bankruptcy in 2006, when he took the reins of the brand
and started an incredibly seamless analog to digital transition which in only
twelve years has placed Leica at the worldwide forefront of top-notch quality
24 x 36 mm format digital cameras (Leica M9, M9 Titanium, M 240, M10 and Leica
SL), APS-C format (Leica T and Leica T2) and medium format (Leica S2), as well
as having greatly enhanced the already exceptional Leica expertise in the
creation of highly luminous lenses delivering reference-class image quality and
boasting great mechanical construction thanks to his utter confidence in
world-class optical designers and engineers like Peter Karbe (Head of Optical
Development at Leica Camera A.G and presently the best optical designer on
earth), Sigrun Kammans (engineer at the Leica sport optics), Michael Hartmann
(optical designer at the Leica sport optics), product managers like Maike
Harberts, Stefan Schultz and Jesko von Oeynhausen, pundits of both analogue and
digital Leica M cameras like Stefan Daniel and many others.
And last by not least, Dr.
Andreas Kaufmann has managed to achieve an impressive economical feat, turning
Leica into a highly profitable, thriving and consolidated firm within the
digital photography scope, something which was already apparent in 2011 with
record sales of 186,4 million euros ( a 73% increase in revenues in comparison
with the 107.6 million euros corresponding to the same third quarter of
2009-2010, significantly improving the best expectations) and greatly
reinforced with its 6% grow in revenue during 2016-2017, while the global
camera market including the rest of firms of the photographic industry (most of
them economically far stronger than Leica and having much more wherewithal of
their own to invest on R & D and launch into market new products in shorter
stretches of time) experienced a decline in sales of 10% during the same period.
© jmse
The presence of Dr.
Andreas Kaufmann during the 22nd Westlicht Photographic Camera Auction on March
10, 2018 in Vienna (Austria) was highly meaningful and undoubtedly reveals the
huge importance bestowed by him to Leica legacy and its most representative
analogue cameras and lenses on which the German photographic brand forged its
legend during XX Century with the LMT39 and M bayonet mount models, the latter
ones having their most faithful continuation in the slim Leica M10 24 x 36 mm
full format rangefinder digital camera already in the XXI Century.
©
jmse
But meanwhile, the huge
prestige, great historical value and awesome technology for the time inherent
to the 24 X 36 mm screwmount and M Leica rangefinder cameras belonging to the
halcyon days of Oskar Barnack, Max Berek, Ernst Leitz II, Ernst Leitz III, Ludwig
Leitz, Willi Stein, Hugo Wehrenfenning, Theo Kisselbach and others, has not
only kept their worth but goes on the upswing, with many models reaching
stratospheric prices in auctions like WestLicht, which substantiates the
unmatched engineering minds who created these real masterpieces of
optomechanical precision, currently to all intends and purposes along
with the gold pattern and the Krugerrands the most reliable investment in
existence, most times with a steady increase in value prospect, irrespective of
the prevailing economical conditions at every moment, as well as being objects
of desire for enthusiasts of the History of Photography, optical designing,
miniaturized mechanics and many other sides which made them unique.
As a matter of fact, this
32nd Westlicht Camera Auction has been by far the most successful celebrated to
date, as always with Leica photographic gear as a core (though also putting on
sale remarkable items from other brands like Nikon, Hasselblad, Canon, Asahi
Pentax, Zeiss Ikon, Alpa, Contessa Nettel, Ernemann, Ica, Goerz, Minox, Robot,
Voigtländer, Rollei, Ihagee, Agfa, Linhof, Meyer Optik and many others), and
aside from its rarity, stunning very good cosmetic condition and perfect
working of the Leica 0 number 122 and its obvious advantages as an investment,
a major percentage of everything surrounding the previous huge levels of
expectation raised by this camera and its subsequent selling for such an
stratospheric price tag is related to the fascinating story of a small camera
concept in symbiosis with tiny very high quality lenses which was born from the
synergy between
Oskar Barnack,
Decisive moment in which
the auctioneer Nikolaus Schauerhuber announces the 2.000.000 million euros (2.4
million euros with premium) winning bid for the Leica 0 Number 122 from 1923 in
very good cosmetic condition and still flawlessly working, which has just made
history breaking the world record ever paid for a camera.
The Westlicht
Photographica Auction Hall is overcrowded with people from all over the world
(professional photographers, collectors, investors, world-class experts on
cameras, lenses and optical design, recognized curators, etc) who have attended
live to this milestone event
© jmse
© jmse
Oskar Barnack,
© jmse
Ernst Leitz II and
© jmse
Max Berek, becoming a
turning point in the history of photography 93 years ago, in 1925, with the
introduction of the Leica I (Model A), the camera that changed photography and first
production model of a future series of exceedingly small and light models with
top-of-the-line highly luminous lenses that made possible a new type of
photography much more agile, dynamic and spontaneous than the previous very big
and heavy large format and medium format cameras respectively using glass
plates and roll films, something which would be even more fostered from 1932
onwards with the Leica II (Model D) featuring a built-in rangefinder and which
definitely built up the development of modern photojournalism and getting
defining moments as its raison d´être.
Both the Leica Ur from
1936 and the Leica 0 preproduction prototypes were their forebears.
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