It is hard to imagine today the difficulties faced by a photographer in the late 19th century who sought to capture the mountains in order to highlight their majesty. It was certainly possible to do so with small portable cameras (Sella himself carried a Kodak 9x12, but only for snapshots), yet to achieve results of such extraordinary quality as those presented here, one had to resort to bulky and cumbersome view cameras, as the large negatives were used to produce contact prints rich in astonishing detail. To achieve this, one also needed a certain ingenuity in devising systems to protect against the wind, which would shake the camera tripod, and the mountaineers’ own ability to reach the right vantage points: this is the case with the meticulous photograph of the Matterhorn and, three years later, of Gran Paradiso. The details are astonishing, as is that sense of depth which allows the viewer to feel fully immersed in the scene.