Louis-Emile Durandelle
French, 1839–1917
Stage Frieze and Cornice
INV-2152
Louis-Emile Durandelle
French, 1839–1917c. 1870
Stage Frieze and Cornice
Louis-Emile Durandelle French, 1839–1917 →19th centuryphotographalbumen silver print
Date
c. 1870
Medium
Albumen print, from "Le nouvel Opéra de Paris, Sculpture ornementale" (1875)
Dimensions
Image/paper: 37.9 × 28.2 cm (14 15/16 × 11 1/8 in.); Mount: 63 × 45.2 cm (24 13/16 × 17 13/16 in.)
Museum
Art Institute of Chicago
Location
Chicago, IL
Credit
Smart Family Acquisition Fund
One of the most accomplished architectural photographers in 19th-century France, Louis-Emile Durandelle is best known for his 1861–75 photographs of the construction of the Paris Opéra, an opulent structure that would come to symbolize the ambitions of Second Empire Paris. Durandelle produced some 200 images of the building and published 115, including this one, in the massive, eight-volume architectural work Le nouvel Opéra de Paris. Much of what Durandelle photographed was not visible to the unaided eye: close-up details of decorative elements, for example, or structural elements hidden inside the completed building. His images freed architects from drawing complex patterns and moldings by hand, kept clients abreast of construction progress, and formed a historical record of a huge urban undertaking.
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