B.
Nostalgia's not what it used to be
Behind the scenes
While we are closed, we are able to research some of the works in our collection whose stories have not been told.
And this one, it turns out, has quite a tale to tell. Lurking in our collection as plain 'Street scene' by Leon Lhermitte, we now know that it depicts the junction of the rue St André and the rue de Buci, in Paris. It was commissioned in 1883 for the art magazine Portfolio, where it would have appeared as a print suitable for framing: not a mere reproduction in the magazine itself.
Portfolio was the creation of artist, essayist and critic Philip Hamerton (1834-1894) and was notable for its very high quality reproductions. The wonders of digitization mean that the whole run is available free online thanks to the Internet Archive and the University of Toronto, and from that source comes this note, which accompanied the etching:
To our eyes Baron Haussmann's boulevards simply are Paris but it is useful to be reminded that they also destroyed neighborhoods, forced up rents and changed many people's lives for the worse. By 1883, much of the medieval city would already have gone and so this print is very much a protest against development and a nostalgic tribute to a quainter, more picturesque cityscape
It is worth noting that although Paris has undergone many subsequent transformations, this particular corner of the left bank has not, and these particular streets are in fact largely unchanged:
Google Street View, July 2012
Leon Lhermitte Rue St André etching. Collection of Christchurch Art Gallery Te Puna o Waiwhetū
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Collection
Leon A Lhermitte Rue St André
This etching was created for the 1883 Portfolio magazine, where it appeared opposite page 150. In introducing the etching, the magazine's publisher Philip Hamerton wrote: 'The spectator is supposed to be at a point in the Rue St. André des Arts from which may be seen the Carrefour and Rue de Buci. It is a very well-known spot in southern Paris, as it includes the angles of four streets familiar to every Parisian,— the rues de Seine, de l’Ancienne Comédie, Mazarine, and Dauphne. The object of the present illustration is to give the reader an accurate idea of the average Parisian streets as they existed before the new kind of Haussmann street was invented. The picturesque of the middle ages had almost entirely departed, though it was still met with occasionally, as in the gabled house in the distance of our etching; but as the streets were generally tortuous and the houses irregular, there was still a picturesque variety not to be met with in the new straight Boulevards and Avenues. Fashionable people lived contentedly on their flats in these streets at more moderate rents than they pay at present, and the whole system of Parisian life was narrower, simpler, and less ostentatious.'