# Ornamental Scupture

- By: Louis-Émile Durandelle (French, 1839–1917)
- By: Ducher et Cie., Editeurs
- Date: c. 1865–72
- Medium: albumen print from wet collodion negative
- Classification: Photograph
- Dimensions: Image: 28.1 x 38.1 cm (11 1/16 x 15 in.)
- Culture: France, 19th century
- Credit line: John L. Severance Fund
- Museum: [Cleveland Museum of Art](https://clevelandart.org/art/1990.116)
- Rights: [Public domain (CC0)](https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/)
- Picture: https://openaccess-cdn.clevelandart.org/1990.116/1990.116_web.jpg
- Who can see it: Kids profiles and older (museums give no ratings; placed by Invisible Network from the museum's own words)

Napoleon III commissioned a new opera house that was adorned with lavishly decorated facades and surfaces inside and out, like this sculptural molding that topped doors in the building’s side galleries. Louis-Émile Durandelle photographed it while still in the workshop; he blacked out the background in the negative. The opera house became the setting for Gaston LeRoux’s 1910 novel The Phantom of the Opera, which inspired the 1976 musical and 2004 film.