Renou Musical Photographer Automaton

French, a young girl is depicted taking a photograph of a doll standing on a stool. The girl is positioned behind a tripod-mounted box camera and holds the shutter's bulb release in her right hand. In her left hand is an unexposed photographic plate. When the automaton is activated, the girl first raises the unexposed plate and then lowers it into the camera. Following that, she moves her right hand, as if counting the length of the exposure. Finally, she raises the finished plate, which now exhibits an image of the doll. All of these actions are accompanied by music from a cylinder musical box movement in the base. The automaton measures 15 1/2" high. Illustrated in "The History of Photography as seen through the Spira Collection", page 200. Purchased from Sotheby's New York, 1982 auction of the Samuel F. Pryor International Doll Museum