[BAUDELAIRE] CARJAT, Étienne (1828-1906)

[BAUDELAIRE] CARJAT, Étienne (1828-1906)

Period albumen print
[Paris, between late 1861 and early 1862]. Wet stamp « Et. Carjat »
(25.1 × 18.5 cm) Mounted on card, with the photographer’s blind stamp (31.8 × 24.9 cm).
Mounted on thick cardboard with embossed photographer’s credit
Cropped corners, some stains, eyes post processed by the photographer, some pen annotations on verso
Museum glass framing (reversible), anthracite mount with a white bevel, gilt frame

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Baudelaire’s Candidacy for the Académie française:
Driven by a genuine desire for literary recognition and academic distinction, Baudelaire formally announces his candidacy for the Académie française by submitting a letter to Abel Villemain, the institution’s Permanent Secretary, in early December 1861. Around the same time, the poet commissions a portrait from Étienne Carjat in the hope of lending greater credibility to his bid.

His candidacy nevertheless elicits mixed reactions. While Lamartine and Sainte-Beuve urge him to withdraw, Charles Asselineau offers his support. Alfred de Vigny, despite his admiration for Baudelaire’s work, also expresses reservations about the undertaking. Gustave Flaubert, whom Baudelaire approaches to intercede on his behalf, makes no secret of his irony in a letter to Jules Sandeau dated 26 January 1862. The press is likewise largely hostile: Le Figaro and La Chronique parisienne, in particular, ridicule the poet’s academic ambitions.

Faced with the institution’s cool reception and the absence of any favourable prospects, Baudelaire eventually withdraws his candidacy on 10 February 1862, before the electoral process reaches its conclusion.

This striking portrait, the most celebrated of the sixteen known photographs of the poet, encapsulates the very essence of his presence and his work. Describing this photograph in Le Tombeau de Baudelaire, Ivanovitch Ourousof writes: “Baudelaire seen from the waist up, wearing a loose, flowing garment, an unstarched shirt collar, and a plain-coloured tie loosely knotted. Clean-shaven face, thinning, short hair brushed forward over the forehead. A sickly, impoverished appearance. A very fine photograph.”

A friend of the poet, Carjat was also a caricaturist and periodical editor. He published contributions by Baudelaire in his weekly journal Le Boulevard. Above all, he left behind a remarkable series of photographic portraits of the poet, taken during three separate sessions, in late 1861 or early 1862, in 1863, and in 1866. During the first session, Étienne Carjat took three different photographs, showing Charles Baudelaire in three successive poses: standing, seated, and, as here, in a bust-length portrait—the most intense of the three, with its dramatically close framing. These portraits were advertised for sale in the 12 January 1862 issue of Le Boulevard.

The only known print made during Baudelaire’s lifetime:
The studio address on Rue Laffitte embossed in the stamp makes it possible to date this print to the period between the taking of the photograph and Étienne Carjat’s move to Rue Pigalle in 1866. Carjat had established his first studio at 56 Rue Laffitte, Paris, in 1861. However, following financial difficulties and disputes with his business partners, Georges-Mathurin Legé and Sosthène Bergeron-Danguy, he was compelled to sell them his studio and photographic business in 1866. Legé and Bergeron subsequently used an embossed stamp retaining Carjat’s name but adding their own.

This portrait has become the most famous likeness of the poet.

“It is a large print that bears comparison with Nadar’s portraits, both in the extraordinary solidity of the figure and in the dramatic chiaroscuro that deepens the features, lending the gaze an almost unbearable intensity in its anguish” (Nadar catalogue, 1994, p. 84).

Although Baudelaire strongly disapproved of photography, his notebooks record frequent visits to Carjat’s studio. Of his own portrait, Baudelaire remarked: “It is not perfect, because such perfection is impossible, but I have rarely seen anything so good” (quoted in the Carjat catalogue, 1983, p. 22).

The treasured print from the family of Charles Baudelaire’s mother

Provenance: Caroline Dufaÿs, subsequently Baudelaire, then Aupick (1794–1871), with whom the poet maintained a relationship that was often turbulent yet passionate, and in any event close.
Thereafter, Félicité Baudelaire, née Ducessois (1812–1902), by inheritance. She was the widow of Charles Baudelaire’s half-brother, Alphonse (1805–1862). Although Charles criticised her in his later years, he had feigned romantic interest in her when young in order to provoke Alphonse, and subsequently remained sympathetic towards her for many years. In 1871, she inherited part of Caroline Aupick’s estate, including the Baudelaire-related mementoes it contained. These subsequently passed into the hands of the children of her brother, Félix Ducessois (1826–1897), as Félicité herself had no children. The provenance then continued through Henri and Louise Ducessois, Félicité’s nephew and niece, and subsequently Geneviève and Raffael Ducessois.

This albumen print should not be confused with the photoglyptie (photoglyptic reproduction) published later in the series Galerie contemporaine.