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NADAR elevating Photography to Art
NADAR elevating Photography to Art

NADAR elevating Photography to Art

Original Language TitleNADAR élevant la Photographie à la hauteur de l'Art
Artist Honoré Daumier (French, 1808 - 1879)
Printer Bertauts (French, ca. 1830 - 1880)
DateMay 25, 1862
MediumLithograph
DimensionsSheet: 13 1/4 × 10 1/4 inches (33.66 × 26.04 cm)
Mount: 19 3/4 × 12 7/8 inches (50.17 × 32.7 cm)
Credit LineGift of the Hall Family Foundation
Object number2017.68.297
SignedInitialed on image recto, lower left, in black pencil: "hD"; On sheet recto, bottom, in black type: "IMP. BERTAUTS, PARIS."
InscribedOn sheet recto, bottom, in black type: "NADAR élevant la Photographie á la hauteur de l'Art" [Translation: NADAR elevating Photography to Art"; On mount recto, bottom, in pencil: "DELTEIL 3248 / in Lo en hauteur - lithographie .[?] etat sur 2 / RARE / ("Souveuir d'artiste" en haut a gauche - "367" en haut a droite) / (Publie daus "Le Boulevard" 25Mai 1862)".
MarkingsOn sheet recto, lower right, in pencil: "243R" / "D.3248"; On sheet verso, lower right corner, in pencil: "243". none
On View
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DescriptionIllustration published in Le Boulevard of man in hot air balloon with sign on front reading "Photographie Nadar". He bends down to look through the back of a box camera as his top hat flies off. Tiny buildings seen below are labeled "Photographie".Gallery Label

A painter, sculptor, and illustrator, Honoré Daumier gained renown for his satirical cartoons of mid-1800s French politics and society.

This lithograph (a kind of print) pictures the photographer Nadar (Gaspard-Félix Tournachon), celebrated in Paris for his aerial views of the city and artistic portraits of well-known French personalities. Daumier exaggerates Nadar’s fervor to capture a photograph by depicting him in his hot air balloon, losing his hat and about to fall from his lofty perch. Daumier’s caption also pokes fun at the assertion, held by many photographers at the time, that photography should be elevated to a form of “high art” like painting or sculpture.

Provenance
Gérard Lévy (1934-2016), Paris, France;
Purchased at his posthumous sale, Gérard Lévy, Photographies de Collection II, Millon, Paris, June 16, 2017, lot 14 by Vintage Works, Ltd., Chalfont, PA, 2017;
Purchased from him by the Hall Family Foundation, Kansas City, MO, 2017;
Their gift to The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, MO, 2017.
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