Man with Walking Stick
Auguste Giraudon's Artist (French)
late 1870s
- Medium
- albumen print from wet collodion negative
- Classification
- Photograph
- Dimensions
- Image: 17.1 x 11.2 cm (6 3/4 x 4 7/16 in.); Paper: 17.1 x 11.2 cm (6 3/4 x 4 7/16 in.); Matted: 45.7 x 35.6 cm (18 x 14 in.)
- Culture
- France, 19th century
- Museum
- Cleveland Museum of Art, Photography
- Credit line
- Purchase from the J. H. Wade Fund
- Rights
- Public domain (CC0), as the museum states it.
- Who can see it
- Tweens profiles and older: its subjects are known and suit older children. How works are placed
View at the Cleveland Museum of Art
About this work
Auguste Giraudon was an important Parisian publisher of photographs. During the 1870s, he commissioned one or more artists—probably a French painter who wished to remain anonymous—to create photographs of peasants. Now called Giraudon’s Artist, this photographer was one of the few in the 1800s specializing in rural figure studies created for use by artists. The images were likely taken near Barbizon, a destination popular with artists who wanted to work from nature. The artistry of these images derives from their skillful use of light, ability to render a subject in the landscape, and a perceptive depiction of human dignity.
