[Cobblestone Street, Paris]
Returned to lender
This work of art was on loan to the museum and has since been returned to its lender.Brassaï, born Gyula Halász in Hungarian Transylvania, developed a reputation in Paris as a chronicler of the night—something newly possible with the introduction of faster film emulsions and flashbulbs. This study of a cobblestone street appears as the front endpaper in his influential book Paris de nuit (1932), which surveys the activities and topography of the city after dark, from the unsavory, raucous bars of Montparnasse to the shadowy trees and bridges flanking the Seine. Brassaï was inspired by everyday life in Paris and commented: "I don’t invent anything...it is the most sincere and humble depiction of reality, of the most trivial, that leads to the fantastic."
Artwork Details
- Title: [Cobblestone Street, Paris]
- Artist: Brassaï (French (born Romania), Brașov 1899–1984 Côte d'Azur)
- Date: 1931–32
- Medium: Gelatin silver print
- Dimensions: Image: 7 in. × 9 1/4 in. (17.8 × 23.5 cm)
Sheet: 9 in. × 10 7/8 in. (22.9 × 27.6 cm)
Frame: 14 1/2 × 16 × 3/4 in. (36.8 × 40.6 × 1.9 cm) - Classification: Photographs
- Credit Line: Ann Tenenbaum and Thomas H. Lee Collection
- Curatorial Department: Photographs