Three Pipers (Trois Pifferari)

Charles Nègre belonged to the first generation of artist-photographers in France. His training as an artist informed all of the works in his large and varied oeuvre, perhaps especially his studies of the street people of Paris and their occupations, long a favorite subject of printmakers. His genre scenes, which were posed because of the protracted exposures, are pioneering examples of street photography, depicting familiar types such as ragpickers, chimney sweeps, and stonemasons. Exotic Italian pipers, shown here at rest in a palpitating light, had a strong presence in the artistic and musical imagination of the day. Nègre's salted paper print lends a soft, pictorial effect to the details of their instruments, costume, and physiognomy.