De la barricade à la ruine (From barricade to ruins - The Paris Commune)

The Paris Commune was the first large-scale social event to be
photographed by a variety of witnesses who experienced the
events from the inside at the heart of their own city. What the
photographs of the Commune show us today, is not a faithful
account of the events as they occurred, nor are they merely an
illustration of the political standpoint of their authors. They
represent the unforgettable scenario of the final chapter of the
history of the ""Nineteenth Century Capital''. Photography has
left us the fragile and moving remnants of a fugitive moment
when a dream was fulfilled; the moment when Paris and its people
were one. The triumphant communards pose on their barricades,
Paris and the streets are now in their possession. They also
pose near the debris of the recently tumbled column of the place
Vendôme in order that photography can record the symbolic
coronation of the taking of Paris for posterity. What follows
almost immediately however is the interminable inventory of the
ruins which represents the collapse of the dream. Photography
acts as fascinating proof of the fulfilment of the poet
Baudelaire's prophecy: ""The Paris of old is dead''. The
Parisian street which was the centre of life, exchange, colours
and smells that had been depicted so well in 19th C. literature
had collapsed to make way for the open spaces and geometrical
precision of the Haussmans and the Le Corbusiers to follow. The
pedestrian is now a mere dot on the townscape. The photographs
of 1871 are today's evidence of this 19th C. urban collapse.
(Magazins Summary)


Citaten:
Scharf, A.: Art and Photography (1968)
Rouillé, A.: L'Empire de la Photographie (1982)
Barret, A.: Les Premiers Reporters photographes, 1848-1914 (1977)
Lapostolle, Ch.: Plus vrai que le vrai, stratégie photographique Commune de Paris (1988)
Hiepe, R.: Kommune und Photographie (Tendenzen 73, 1971)
Neumann, Th.: Photographie zur Zeit der Pariser Kommunen (in: Pariser Kommune 1871, 1971)
Robinot, A.: La Commune photographiée (Cahiers de la cinémathèque 37, 1983)
Gautrand, J.-C.: 1870-1871: Les Photographes et la Commune (Photo-ciné-revue febr. 1972)
Lefèbvre, H.: La Proclamation de la Commune (1965)
Benjamin, W.: Charles Baudelaire (1982)
Macchia, G.: Paris en ruine (1988)
Sandblad, N.G.: Manet: Three Studies in Artistic Conception (1974)
Bataille, G.: Manet (1955, repr. 1983)