Eugene Atget Photographer - ACE118.4

Atget, posed by Abbott. Narrator talks about him in the 1920s, quoting reminiscences of neighbours, etc. Detail from Au Petit Bacchus - rue St. Louis-en-l'Ile 61. Detail from Cabaret de l'enseigne de l'homme armé (1900). Shop front, statuary. Allée de l’eté, parc de Versailles. Atget in the gardens at Versailles, contemplating gigantic urn: photographs. Atget at the Orangery steps: Versailles, l'escalier de l'Orangerie. Other Versailles photographs. General view along main avenue. Narrator says that Atget took more than 300 pictures at Versailles; he "inflates its aristocratic flavour by celebrating the craftsmen who built it…" Versailles, l'escalier de l'Orangerie, etc. Abbott VO says Atget would sometimes "proceed along an entire street, with a moving-picture-like sequence. Examples. Cabaret de l'enseigne de l'homme armé (1900). Au Petit Bacchus - rue St. Louis-en-l'Ile 61. Au petit Dunkerque, 3 quai Conti (1900). Au Tambour, 63 quai de la Tournelle. A la Biche, 35 rue Geoffrey Saint-Hilaire (1905). Montage showing the numbers Atget had scratched into the negatives of each picture. Narrator says he concluded that each was "part of a vast series", and that Abbott’s observation was therefore significant. There were five series, Old Paris, of more than 3,700 images (examples); three more "dealt with various aspects of Paris and its environs" including Coiffeur, avenue de l’Observatoire; Boucherie, Rue Christine (1923-1924), Men’s Fashions (1923-1925), Mannequin (1927), Carrousel (1923), Pompe Funèbres (1’ère classe) (1910); the final series was the "documents for artists", trees, etc.: Paveur, Faucheurs, Somme, tree roots at Parc de St. Cloud (1906), Nénuphars (water lilies) (before 1900), and others. Narrator calculates that there were around 10,000 plates in total. Atget opening his post and learning that returned prints have gone astray. Narrator says that in 1903, the South Kensington Museum bought about 300 prints, many purchased "as records of Parisian architectural ironmongery": examples. Puits 5 rue du Figuier (1900); Au Petit Bacchus – rue St. Louis-en-l'Ile 61; Cabaret de l'enseigne de l'homme armé. Atget visits publisher with album of photographs; Narrator says this selection – which was rejected – was uneven and not his best work