Is this really Chopin moments after his death? Photo: AP

A newly discovered daguerrotype that purportedly shows Chopin on his deathbed has sparked a flurry of interest amongst fans of the composer.

The tattered picture was purchased by Wladyslaw Zuchowski, the owner of a photography gallery in Gdansk.

Zuchowski acquired the work from a Scottish collector, and he believes that the image may have come from the collection of Jane Stirling, a pupil of the pianist.

Stirling, the daughter of a Scottish aristocrat, was amongst Chopin's most devoted admirers, although the composer was not entirely smitten with her country.

“The population is ugly, but apparently good-natured,” the composer wrote to a friend. Meanwhile, experts have been quick to cast doubts over the image.

Alicja Knast, curator of the Chopin Museum in Warsaw, says that there is no proof that the man represented in the picture is the great Polish composer, in spite of similarities.

Meanwhile, Malgorzata Grabczewska from the Polish Library in Paris says that signature on the image is dubious.

The daguerrotype is signed Louis Auguste Bisson, who photographed Chopin on another occasion. However, Grabczewska argues that Bisson never signed his works.

“There are no doubts that the work comes from the 19th century, but is it definitely a death bed scene photographed by Bisson?” she queried. (nh/jb)

Source: AP/Gazeta Wyborcza