Charles Meryon, The Pont-au-Change, Paris (1854), courtesy Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute |
Few cities have been chronicled more extensively than Paris. The Clark’s exhibition “Second Empire Paris: History and Modernity” suggests that the act of chronicling is as significant as what is being documented. The views of Paris in this small but provocative show of prints and photographs provide glimpses of the forces at work— political, sociological, and artistic—as the city was transformed into a gleaming modern capital. As the Second Republic lurched to its disappointing end, a promising new leader stepped forward. Like his namesake, Louis-Napoléon understood the art of self-promotion: “The name of Napoléon is a program in itself. At home it means order, authority, religion, and the well-being of the people; abroad, national dignity.” The French responded by installing him as president and, soon after, Emperor Napoléon III.
The reign of Napoléon IIIlasted from 1852 to 1870. During this eventful period, France finally caught up with the rest of Europe, adding railroads and improving already existing roads, liberalizing commercial policy, expanding industry, and establishing a new retail model, the department store. One of the emperor’s most cherished projects was the transformation of Paris from a crowded, unsanitary urban hodgepodge to a progressive capital of “light and air.” Baron Georges-Eugène Haussmann, named Prefect of the Seine by the emperor, took on this formidable task. The modernization of Paris improved sanitation and traffic