Artcurial auctions
a rare album of portraits by Gustave Le Gray
from the collection of Alfred de Vigny

Auction: Tuesday 15th November: 2:30pm

Public exhibitions :
Thursday 10th November: 11am - 7pm
Friday 11th November: 11am – 7pm
Saturday 12th November: 11am – 6pm
Monday 14th November: 11am – 7pm

Online catalogue:
www.artcurial.com

Contact :
Lorena de La Torre
+33 (0)1 42 99 16 58
ldelatorre@artcurial.com

A rare album of portraits by 19th century French photographer Gustave Le Gray will be sold at Artcurial in Paris on November 15, as part of the Alfred de Vigny collection.

The leather bound album which was bequeathed to the poet by the family of Léon Maufras, contains 113 portraits, including a self-portrait signed in ink by the photographer. Most of these formal portraits were created in Gustave Le Gray's studio at 35 boulevard des Capucines, between 1855 and 1859. These albumen prints were probably gathered by Léon Maufras, a lawyer and friend of the photographer, when he was missioned by Le Gray to foreclose his Paris studio. There are five portraits of Léon Maufras in the album and a curious pair of "souvenir" photographs in which he and Le Gray appear alternately amongst a group of men, seated outdoors around a table enjoying their wine. Portraits of important figures from the Second Empire mingle with portraits of the photographer's circle, including his family and studio personnel. Several sitters in the portraits have yet to be identified.

The quality of the prints in this album, most of which have preserved their rich tonalities, demonstrate the photographer's mastery of chemistry. All of the portraits in this album are rare (Count Olympe Aguado, Alexandre Dumas, Vice-Roy of Egypt). More than half of them are the only known prints known to exist to this day. Twelve portraits were reproduced in the catalogue of the Gustave Le Gray 1820-1884 retrospective exhibition held at the Bibliothèque Nationale de France and the J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles in 2002.