[Portal, Church of Saint-Trophime, Arles]
ca. 1864
![[Portal, Church of Saint-Trophime, Arles] by Edouard Baldus](https://images.artheonmuseum.org/met/ph/thumb/portal-church-of-saint-trophime-arles-267017.webp)
Medium
Albumen silver print from glass negative
Dimensions
7.0 x 14.2 cm. (2 3/4 x 5 9/16 in.)
Classification
Photographs
Department
Photographs
Museum
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, NY
Credit
Gift of Pierre-Marc Richard, 1994
Accession Number
1994.179.1
Tags
Art Historical Context
Step through time with Édouard Baldus's captivating *Portal, Church of Saint-Time, Arles* (ca. 1864), a exquisite albumen silver print that freezes the grandeur of this Romanesque masterpiece. Nestled in the sun-drenched Provençal city of Arles, the's west portal is a sculptural triumph of the 12th century, adorned with biblical figures, apostles, and intricate tympanum scenes depicting the Last Judgment—hallmarks of medieval stone-carving artistry that once awed pilgrims along the Camino de Santiago. Baldus, a pioneering French photographer commissioned by Napoleon III to document France's a...
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...