Atget FROM THE PUBLISHER
This superbly reproduced volume presents the essence of the work of the great French photographer, Eugène Atget, in one hundred carefully selected photographs. John Szarkowski, an acknowledged master of the art of looking at photographs, explores in this book the unique sensibilities that made Atget one of the greatest artists of the twentieth century and a vital influence on the development of modern and contemporary photography. Szarkowski's eloquent introductory text and commentaries form an extended essay on the remarkable visual intelligence displayed in these subtle, sometimes enigmatic pictures.
Atget was a commercial photographer who devoted more then thirty years of his life to the task of documenting the city of Paris, its environs, and the French countryside in more than eight thousand photographs. In the process, he created an oeuvre that brilliantly explains the great richness, complexity, and authentic character of his native culture. His uncompromising eye recorded the picturesque villages and landscape of France; the storied chateaux and the romantic parks and gardens of the ancien r�gime of Louis XIV; and, in Paris, architectural details, private courtyards, quaint shop windows, curious buildings and streets, and various denizens of the urban scene of his times. Atget died almost unknown in 1927, although groups of his prints were included in various Paris archives. In 1925 the young American artist Berenice Abbott had discovered his work, and after his death she arranged to buy his archives with the help of art dealer Julien Levy; in 1968 that collection was purchased by the Museum of Modern Art.
ACCREDITATION
Eugène Atget was born near Bordeaux, in France, in 1857, and was raised by an uncle from an early age after the deaths of his parents. He became a cabin boy and sailor, and traveled widely until 1879, when he entered the National Conservatory of Dramatic Arts in Paris. He studied there for two years and worked as a minor actor for the next few years, during which period he devloped a relationship with the actress Valentine Delafosse, who later became his photographic assistant, and with whom he lived for the rest of his life. Unsuccessful as an actor and later as a painter, he finally picked up photography in 1898, at age 40. Over the next 30 years, using obsolete equipment (an 18 x 24 cm bellows camera, rectilinear lenses, a wooden tripod, and a few plate holders), he made over 10,000 photographs of the daily appearance of a rapidly changing Paris. Most of these were sold as documents to libraries and museums, as well as to artists, stage designers, and interior decorators. Perhaps it was not until 1926, when Man Ray published a few of Atget's photographs in the magazine La Révolutions Surréaliste, that his work began to be appreciated as art. Atget died one year later, but the appreciation for his work has grown exponentially since.
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