Photographie originale d'Alexandre Dumas

Original photograph of Alexandre Dumas

Paris [ca 1860] | 6.4 x 10.4 cm | one photograph

Original photograph on albumen paper laminated on card taken by Gustave Le Gray and showing a bearded Alexandre Dumas in white trousers. Contemporary print.
Model name written in pencil at the bottom of the shot. Deep blacks and beautiful contrast.
Very beautiful full-length portrait of the writer looking intensely at the camera.
About this photo, which he prints on the front page of the Monte-Cristo review dated 5 January 1860, Alexandre Dumas writes: «I only want to state the first, the most essential, quality of this portrait: resemblance. It's up to you, dear readers, to see if the photograph has gone any further. It is also that I must say to you that I did not allow myself to be guided by chance in the choice of the photographer, and that in Mr Gray I simply met an artist of the best quality. Go and find him, judges of photography told me great things, and you will be happy. I went to see him and I was amazed. I understood – something that after having had a hundred portraits by a hundred different photographers, you may not yet suspect, dear reader – I understood that, as a photographer, Le Gray is both an artist and a scholar.»