Eugene Atget

Born: 12 February, 1857

Place: Libourne, Gironde, Aquitaine, France

Died: 4 August, 1927 (aged 70)

Place: Paris, France

BACKGROUND:

Eugene Atget was born in Libourne, France in 1857 to Jean-Eugène and Clara-Adeline Atget. However, five years later in 1962, both of his parents died. He was put into an orphanage, but at seven years old, he was pulled out to live with his grandparents in Bordeaux. He finished secondary school there and later joined a merchant navy. In 1878, Atget moved to Paris to peruse acting, but failed the exam to take an acting class the first time, but made it his second. However, he was drafted into the military and could only attend the classes part-time. Nine years later, Atget found that he had an infection in his vocal cords which forced him to give up acting. However, Atget did not want to give up his artistic side and therefore pursued used photography. He took his first pictures in 1888 of Amiens and Beauvais. In 1890, he moved to Paris where he became a professional photographer.

PHOTOGRAPHY CAREER:

When Atget began to pursue photography, there was major expansion in both commercial and amateur photography. Atget used a large-format wooden bellows camera, which was very new for his time period. Since the camera was a more recent model, he had to play around with it to see how to control perspectives and various camera settings such as long exposure. One of Atget's most famous series of photos that captured a picturistic views of old buildings of Paris. He began to document the older Paris in the 1900s, mainly focusing on buildings before or during the French Revolution. By doing this, Atget expanded his audience that saw his photos. They became so big that photographers such as Henri Matisse, Marcel Duchamp, Picasso,Maurice Utrillo, Edgar Degas, and Andre Derain saw his photos in the 1920s and were amazed by them. He also kept a notebook known as the Repertoire that composed a bunch of old dances and plays that he wrote down while going around Paris capturing these photos. This notebook is being displayed at the Museum of Modern Art in New York. Now, the MoMA hold a lot of Atget's work, as does the US Library of Congress and the Philadelphia Museum of Art. After Atget died, his close co-worker, Bernice Abbott, held most of his photographs and also sold them to many people that were previously listed. She used the money to donate to places that Atget supported.