127 - Eugène ATGET (1857–1927)

Eugène ATGET (1857–1927) Small fried food shop, Rue Mouffetard (5th arrondissement) Interior of a fried food shop as seen from the street: range hood, stove, cauldron, basin resting on a stool, scale, basket of potatoes, hanging paper cones; painted display window reading “Brand… 20—Specialty of Saumur and Beaujolais.” Silver print 23.8 x 18.2 cm Very slight tear in the upper right corner Inscription on the reverse: Annotation in ink: “Small fried food shop on Rue Mouffetard.” Provenance: former collection of Jean-Marie Drot Born in Libourne in 1857, Eugène Atget worked as a sailor and then as an actor before devoting himself to photography around 1890. Settling on Rue Campagne-Première, he produced “documents for artists” and spent nearly forty years photographing old Paris: streets, courtyards, storefronts, signs, small trades, parks, and interiors. His thousands of photographs were acquired by the National Library, the Carnavalet Museum, and the Monuments Historiques, which saw them as a record of a city in the process of disappearing. Man Ray and the Surrealists, followed by Berenice Abbott—who saved a large portion of his collection—revealed the poetic dimension of his work. He died in Paris in 1927 and is considered one of the fathers of modern documentary photography.