Vue de Saïgon (Feuille No. 1)
1866
Medium
Albumen silver print from glass negative
Dimensions
24.7 x 34.2 cm (9 3/4 x 13 7/16 in.)
Classification
Photographs
Department
Photographs
Museum
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, NY
Credit
Gilman Collection, Purchase, The Horace W. Goldsmith Gilman Collection, Purchase, The Horace W. Goldsmith Foundation Gift, through Joyce and Robert Menschel, 2005
Accession Number
2005.100.501 (26)
Tags
Art Historical Context
Émile Gsell's *Vue de Saïgon (Feuille No. 1)*, created in 1866, offers a captivating early photographic glimpse of Saigon (now Ho Chi Minh City) during the dawn of French colonial rule in Vietnam. Captured just four years after the 1862 Treaty of Saigon ceded the city and surrounding areas to France, this image likely showcases the bustling urban landscape along the Saigon River, blending traditional Vietnamese architecture with emerging colonial influences. As one of the first professional photographers in Indochina, Gsell served as the official photographer for the French administration, doc...
About the Artist
Emile Gsell · 1838–1879
Emile Gsell (1838–1879) was a French photographer who became one of the earliest Western photographers to document Southeast Asia, particularly the ancient temples of Angkor in Cambodia. Born in Sainte-Marie-aux-Mines in Alsace, France, Gsell traveled to Indochina in the 1860s, establishing a photographic studio in Saigon (present-day Ho Chi Minh City) that became a base for his documentary expedi...