Collection Online as of April 1, 2023
Village Scene (Southern France)
André-Adolphe-Eugène Disdéri
(French, 1819–1889)
Salted paper print from waxed paper negative
Image: 15.2 x 12.2 cm (6 x 4 13/16 in.); Matted: 45.7 x 35.6 cm (18 x 14 in.)
John L. Severance Fund 1996.352
Location
not on view
Description
Although best known for his development of the carte-de-visite photograph which immortalized many a Parisian, Disdéri's photographic career began around 1850 in a daguerrian studio in Brest. Beset with financial problems, he left his studio, wife, and family and moved to Nîmes in December 1852 or January 1853 where he learned the wet collodion-on-glass and wax paper negative processes. The oval vignette cropping and picturesque approach to the posed, but seemingly spontaneous, arrangement of figures and animals engaged in an outdoor activity in Village Scene is typical of the work Disdéri produced in Nîmes in 1853, for he abandoned the wax paper negative soon after learning it.
André-Adolphe-Eugène Disdéri
André-Adolphe-Eugène Disdéri French, 1819-1889
Disdéri is best known as a portraitist and popularizer of the carte-de-visite. He spent 10 years as a painter and working in the theater, and another five in the clothing business, before becoming seriously interested in photography around age 30. He first operated studios in Brest and Nîmes, then moved to Paris and opened a studio in 1854, and a second in 1863. In 1854 Disdéri patented the carte-de-visite, a method of producing a number of small images on a single negative that achieved great popularity. He later opened additional studios in London, Madrid, and Toulon.
Disdéri was one of the best known portrait photographers of his day, with many important commissions and sitters. Like Mathew Brady, he was an innovator and entrepreneur as well as an artist. The carte-de-visite, which he did not invent, but rather adapted, helped photography to become increasingly versatile as a medium and available to people of all means. In 1879 Disdéri sold his business and moved to Nice. Despite his success, he died 10 years later in Paris in poverty, obscurity, and poor health. T.W.F.