581 - Laure Albin Guillot* (Paris 1879 - 1962 Paris)

Laure Albin Guillot* (Paris 1879 - 1962 Paris) Portrait of a painter vintage gelatin silver print 27 x 21 cm signed, mounted SCHÄTZPREIS / ESTIMATE € 600 - 1200 STARTPREIS / STARTING PRICE € 600 Laure Albin Guillot (1879–1962) was one of the most significant French female photographers of the interwar period, combining portrait, fashion, nude, advertising, and experimental photography with the aesthetic ideas of modern art. After early works in the spirit of Pictorialism, she developed an increasingly clear, decorative visual language during the 1920s and 1930s and worked regularly for *Vogue*, *Femina*, and other major fashion publications. Her subjects included prominent figures of Parisian cultural life such as Paul Valéry, Colette, Anna de Noailles, and Jean Cocteau. With her "Micrographies décoratives," she translated the microscopic structures of plants and minerals into an autonomous photographic realm, thereby bridging science, photography, and decorative art. In 1932, she became head of the photographic archives of the French Beaux-Arts, and in 1933, she assumed the directorship of the Cinémathèque nationale. Albin Guillot’s work occupies a space between Pictorialism, Art Deco, New Photography, and the New Vision. Within the photographic landscape of her time, figures such as Florence Henri, Edward Steichen, and Yva serve as important points of comparison; they shared a quest for a modern, deliberately composed visual language that navigated the realms of portraiture, fashion, the human body, and abstract form. From this, Albin Guillot developed a distinctive French variant of modern studio photography, characterized by the juxtaposition of elegant lighting, classical bodily ideals, geometric composition, and experimental techniques. Her intense integration of photography, literature, and applied art—exemplified by her collaboration with Paul Valéry on *Narcisse*—also made her a key intermediary between the Parisian avant-garde, the fashion world, and the French culture of books and exhibitions during the 1920s and 1930s. PLEASE NOTE: The purchase price consists of the highest bid plus the buyer's premium, sales tax and, if applicable, the fee of artists resale rights and platform fee. In the case of normal taxation (marked ° at the estimate), a premium of 24% is added to the highest bid. The mandatory sales tax is added to the sum of the highest bid, the buyer's premium and platform fee. This amounts to 13% for paintings, drawings, graphic works and sculptures and 20% for photographs and all other items. The buyer's premium amounts to 28% in case of differential taxation. The sales tax is included in the differential taxation.