In the City of Light: Paris, 1850–1920

Avenue du Bois de Boulogne opened in 1854 to connect the Place de l’Etoile (site of the Arc de Triomphe) with the Bois de Boulogne, the new public park on the west end of Paris. Nearly four hundred feet wide and more than three-quarters of a mile long, the avenue’s sidewalks and riding paths, ornamental lawns and exotic flower plantings provided a grand stage for fashionable Parisians to promenade from the center of the city to the park in their carriages and (later) expensive motorcars. Renamed Avenue Foch in 1929, the street remains one of the most prestigious addresses in Paris.

Jacques‑Henri Lartigue (French, 1894–1986), Paris, January 15, 1911—Avenue du Bois de Boulogne, 1911, gelatin silver print, High Museum of Art, Atlanta, gift of Frederick F. Hardin, 1990.30.

The Parisian Sarah Bernhardt (born Henriette-Rosine Bernard, 1844–1923) was perhaps the most celebrated stage actress of her generation. She made several theatrical tours around the world and was one of the first prominent actresses to make sound recordings and act in motion pictures. Nadar’s photo shows the actress in the costume of Doña Sol from Hernani, an early historical play by Victor Hugo whose 1830 premiere resulted in a brawl because of its revolutionary theme.

Nadar (pseudonym for Gaspard-Félix Tournachon) (French, 1820–1910), Portrait of Sarah Bernhardt in the Costume of Doña Sol, ca. 1877, platinum print, High Museum of Art, Atlanta, purchase, 74.168.

Place Breda, the main image of this etching, no longer exists but was once a busy hub in Félix Buhot’s neighborhood of Montmartre. The scene shows life in that working-class district during the coldest winter then on record, with shivering carriage drivers, hurrying delivery men, street sweepers battling snow and ice. Buhot’s most original contribution to etching were his “symphonic margins”—scenes that surround and amplify the principal image, such as a long view of skaters on the Seine near the Pont Neuf at bottom right and horses crashing and dying in the icy streets at left.

Félix Buhot (French, 1847–1898), Winter in Paris, 1879, etching, aquatint, and drypoint, High Museum of Art, Atlanta, purchase for the Ralph K. Uhry Collection in honor of James P. Furniss, President of the Board of the Directors, 1980‑82, 1981.104.

Victor Hugo (1802–1885) is most widely known for his Romantic novels The Hunchback of Notre-Dame (1831) and Les Misérables (1862), which through numerous adaptations on stage and in film have indelibly shaped our image of historical Paris. However, Hugo was also an acclaimed playwright and poet and an elected parliamentarian whose liberal politics earned him fifteen years of exile on the island of Guernsey. When Hugo returned to Paris in 1870, he was hailed as a national hero—people purchased his photographic portraits, cities erected statues to him, and at his death, more than two million people joined the funeral procession. This bust by Auguste Rodin was made for a multifigure monument two years before Hugo’s death.

Auguste Rodin (French, 1840–1917), Bust of Victor Hugo, 1883, bronze, High Museum of Art, Atlanta, purchase with funds given in memory of James F. Schwartz, M.D., 2002.71.