Théophile Gautier

Nadar

ca. 1856 · Salted paper print from glass negative · Photographs

Ringmaster, publicist, and performer in a highly theatrical life, the legendary Nadar wore many hats–those of journalist, bohemian, left-wing agitator, playwright, caricaturist, and aeronaut. He had success in all these roles, but what he did best was collect a pantheon of friends whom he honored with his generous and perceptive photographic portraits. The subject of this portrait, Théophile Gautier (1811-1872), was a poet, novelist, and engaging critic of art and literature who also defined the theory of art for art's sake-art pursued for its own intrinsic perfection. In this portrait by his intimate friend, the hirsute and disheveled writer appears in his working clothes, an apt embodiment of Gautier's self-description as "the terror of the bald and beardless bourgeois."

Artist

Nadar

Date

ca. 1856

Medium

Salted paper print from glass negative

Department

Photographs

Credit line

Gilman Collection, Purchase, Harriette and Noel Levine Gift, 2005