The Pont du Carrousel seen through the Pont Royal
1932
Image not available — this artwork is under copyright
View on museum website →Medium
gelatin silver print
Dimensions
image/sheet: 21.3 x 27.2 cm (8 3/8 x 10 11/16 in.) mount: 40.6 x 50.8 cm (16 x 20 in.)
Classification
Photograph
Department
CPH
Museum
National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.
Credit
Robert B. Menschel Fund
Accession Number
1998.38.3
Art Historical Context
In the shadowy elegance of 1930s Paris, Brassaï captures a mesmerizing nocturnal vista in *The Pont du Carrou seen through the Pont Royal (1932). This silver print, measuring 21.3 x 27.2 cm, frames the intimate interplay of two iconic Seine bridges: the ornate Pont Royal in the foreground and the more distant Pont du Carrouseleding into the misty night. Brassaï, the Hungarian-born photographer renowned for his intimate portrayals of the City of Light after dark, transforms urban architecture into a poetic symphony of light and shadow. A cornerstone of modernist photography, this image exempli...
About the Artist
Brassaï
Brassaï was born Gyula Halász on September 9, 1899, in Brassó, Transylvania — a city then part of Austria-Hungary and now Brașov, Romania — from which he would eventually take his celebrated pseudonym. After studying painting and sculpture at the Hungarian Academy of Fine Arts in Budapest and later at Berlin's Academy of Fine Arts, he settled in Paris in 1924, initially working as a journalist and...