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[Sarah Bernhardt]

Paul Nadar, Nadarnegative about 1864; print about 1924 ?

The J. Paul Getty Museum

The J. Paul Getty Museum
Los Angeles, United States

The extraordinary actress Sarah Bernhardt was about twenty when she posed for Nadar and had barely begun her long and phenomenally successful career. Nadar's photograph was probably the first of innumerable images by painters, photographers, sculptors, and graphic artists. At a time when Nadar was preoccupied with ballooning and willing to leave most of the portrait work to studio assistants, Bernhardt drew him back into the studio to make touching images of her delicate face. Here he wrapped her with a great sweep of velvet that bared one shoulder but showed no more of her slender body, centering all attention on her head, which is seen nearly in profile.

The young woman with the supple shoulders and the golden voice became an incomparable and indomitable actress, famous first in France and then throughout the world for playing heroines-and heroes-in a wide variety of plays. Bernhardt's celebrity and the enormous attention she attracted everywhere she went anticipated the phenomenon of late twentieth-century media stars.

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  • Title: [Sarah Bernhardt]
  • Creator: Nadar [Gaspard Félix Tournachon], Paul Nadar
  • Date Created: negative about 1864; print about 1924 ?
  • Location Created: Paris, France
  • Physical Dimensions: 21.1 × 16.2 cm (8 5/16 × 6 3/8 in.)
  • Type: Print
  • External Link: Find out more about this object on the Museum website.
  • Medium: Gelatin silver print
  • Terms of Use: Open Content
  • Number: 84.XM.436.494
  • Culture: French
  • Credit Line: The J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles
  • Creator Display Name: Nadar [Gaspard Félix Tournachon] (French, 1820 - 1910) Paul Nadar (French, 1856 - 1939)
  • Classification: Photographs (Visual Works)
The J. Paul Getty Museum

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