165 - Eugène ATGET (1857–1927)

Eugène ATGET (1857–1927) Ragpickers, Passage Moret, Ruelle des Gobelins (13th arrondissement), 1913—two prints Two views of the same ragpickers’ courtyard: handcarts unhitched on the cobblestones, wooden galleries with balusters, baskets and bundles, and a house in the background with closed shutters. Silver print 18.2 x 23.8 cm Inscription on the reverse: Two sheets annotated in ink: “Ragpickers, Passage Moret, Ruelle des Gobelins 1913 (13th)” (with a round sticker) and “Ragpickers, Passage Moret, Ruelle des Gobelins (13th) 1913”; “3” in pencil Provenance: former collection of Jean-Marie Drot Bibliography: *Atget Paris*, introduction by Laure Beaumont-Maillet, Paris, Hazan, 1992, reproduced on p. 659. Born in Libourne in 1857, Eugène Atget was a sailor and then an actor before devoting himself to photography around 1890. Settling on Rue Campagne-Première, he produced “reference material 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.