Lyon, Gare de Perrache
ca. 1861
Medium
Albumen silver print from glass negative
Dimensions
Image: 27.9 x 43.3 cm (11 x 17 1/16 in.) Mount: 46 x 60.5 cm (18 1/8 x 23 13/16 in.)
Classification
Photographs
Department
Photographs
Museum
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, NY
Credit
Gilman Collection, Gift of The Howard Gilman Foundation, 2005
Accession Number
2005.100.364.3
Tags
Art Historical Context
In the mid-19th century, France underwent rapid industrialization under Napoleon III, railways symbolized progress and national unity. Édouard Baldus, a of architectural photography, captured this era's engineering marvels with precision. His *Lyon, Gare de Perr* (ca. 1861) depicts the bustling Perrache station in Lyon, key hub on France's expanding rail network. Baldus, originally a painter, turned to photography around 1851, becoming renowned for his commissions to document public works like bridges, stations, and historic monuments. Printed as an albumen silver print from a large glass neg...
About the Artist
Edouard Baldus · 1813–1889
Édouard-Denis Baldus (1813–1889), born in Grünebach, Prussia, moved to Paris in 1838 at age twenty-five to study painting outside the École des Beaux-Arts and atelier system. Trained initially as a painter, draughtsman, and lithographer, he exhibited at the Paris Salons from 1841 to 1851 without notable recognition. Around 1849, Baldus pivoted to photography, embracing William Henry Fox Talbot's p...