Brassaï: Paris Nocturne

by Brassaï (Photographer), Quenten Bajac, Sylvie Aubenas

Brassai (1899–1984) was the first and is still the most famous photographer to chronicle Paris after dark. Born in Hungary, he came to the French capital in 1924, working first as a journalist and then embracing photography, but it was the Paris of the 1930s that forms the bedrock of his body of work.


Walking the city’s streets at night, Brassai captured a previously unseen world on camera. He shows us every face and every facet, from tough guys and showgirls to prostitutes and pleasure-seekers, from the bustling cafés and dance halls to the stillness of deserted streets and mist-shrouded monuments. Through his eyes, Paris becomes a world of shadows, in which light, the prerequisite for any photograph, is reduced to dimly lit windows, streetlamps in the fog, or reflections on a rain-soaked pavement.


This book brings together some of the best-known images from Brassai’s classic Paris After Dark and The Secret Paris of the 30’s, showcasing them alongside previously unpublished photos and archive material. It places his work in its historical and artistic context, analyzing the unique nature of his photographic vision: part reportage, part social document, part poetic exploration.

Genres: Photography, Art, Nonfiction

312 pages, Hardcover

First published September 9, 2013

About the author

George Brassaï (pseudonym of Gyula Halász) (9 September 1899 — 8 July 1984) was a Hungarian photographer, sculptor, and filmmaker who rose to international fame in France in the 20th century. He was one of the numerous Hungarian artists who flourished in Paris beginning between the World Wars. In the early 21st century, the discovery of more than 200 letters and hundreds of drawings and other items from the period 1940–1984 has provided scholars with material for understanding his later life and career.

Reviews

[Manfred · Rating 5 out of 5]

If you are like me, then you cannot own enough coffee table books filled with long-dead prostitutes and street criminals. But even if you are not like me, I recommend this book highly. Brassai was friend to Picasso and Miller and had a very creative eye as he wandered the capital of the civilized world after dark. Technically, none of these photographs are dazzling marvels and Brassai hardly invented street photography. But this is a passport to a Paris that is long vanished and never to return, and therefore essential.

[Geoff]

http://www.nybooks.com/blogs/gallery/...

[Leonard · Rating 3 out of 5]

A very thorough coffee table book about the famous Paris photographer Brassai. It includes many of his photographs taken at night in that famous French city. His work is good, and at that time, quite original and popular, but I still like Atget better. Brassai primarily photographed people and Atget the "cityscapes" of Paris. Both are important but Brassai's work seems more dark and sad, perhaps because it was taken at night and is of people of poor people, the homeless, prostitutes, sewer workers, etc. although Atget's empty streets are not exactly jubilant.