169 - Eugène ATGET (1857–1927)

Eugène ATGET (1857–1927) Porte d’Asnières, Cité Valmy, ragpickers (17th arrondissement), 1913 Cobbled alley: ragpickers’ carts loaded with sacks and straw against a brick wall, three children on the left, a streetlamp and shacks in the background; letter inscribed in the image at the bottom left. Silver print 18.2 x 23.8 cm Inscription on the reverse: Annotation in ink: “Porte d’Asnières, Cité Valmy, ragpickers, 1913.” 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 Historic Monuments department, 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.