At the Fortifications, Porte de Versailles

1898

Auguste Louis Lepère

(French, 1849–1918)

Culture

France, 19th century

Medium

etching

Support

Measurements

Image: 11.9 x 23.4 cm (4 11/16 x 9 3/16 in.); Plate: 15 x 25.9 cm (5 7/8 x 10 3/16 in.); Sheet: 19 x 28.8 cm (7 1/2 x 11 5/16 in.)

Credit Line

Gift of Ralph King 1920.635

Catalogue raisonné

Lotz-Brissonneau 110

State

II/II

You can copy, modify, and distribute this work, all without asking permission. Learn more about CMA's Open Access Initiative.

Location

Not on view

Description

Paris underwent a dramatic redesign beginning in the mid-1800s, resulting in its distinctive appearance today but also in the displacement of residents who worked—but could not afford to live—in the city. In this print, Auguste Lepère presented the “zone,” an area on Paris’s periphery where its most economically disadvantaged and disenfranchised inhabitants lived, including some laundresses. Lepère’s image features a laundry line as the singular domestic touch within an otherwise surreal landscape, part of the city but seemingly rural. The inhabitants of the zone used open land to construct makeshift homes without modern amenities, so that they could subsist on the low wages offered by their urban employment.