Lotus Columns at Gournah

Getty Museum

Lotus Columns at Gournah

Creator

Joseph-Philibert Girault de Prangey

French Daguerreotypist · 1804–1892

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Photographer

Until recently, pioneering daguerreotypist Joseph-Philibert Girault de Prangey was unknown in the world of fine-art photography. His extraordinary images were discovered in a storeroom of his estate in the 1920s and only made known some eighty years later. Girault de Prangey studied painting at the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris and learned daguerreotypy in 1841, the same year inventor Louis-Jacque

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Date: 1842–1843
Medium: Daguerreotype
Culture: French
Department: Photographs
Institution: Getty Museum

The Temple of Seti I is located at the archaeological site of Gournah in Egypt. By moving close to the subject, Girault de Prangey conveyed the gravity and drama of the huge decaying stones. No earlier photograph is known in which the visual elements of light and viewpoint are harnessed so skillfully to express essential aspects of an ancient Egyptian monument. Through his unique, prescient vision, Girault de Prangey created among the greatest achievements in the early history of photography.

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