Paris: la Rue de la Montagne-Ste-Geneviève 1886

Auguste-Louis Lepère created this print of the Rue de la Montagne-Ste-Geneviève in Paris using etching and engraving techniques. The location is the key to understanding this evocative print. The street depicted was known for its concentration of institutions of learning, including the Sorbonne. But Lepère’s print shows us not scholars but ordinary people passing by, and in the foreground a woman who looks to be a worker, perhaps a shop assistant, heading home after a long day. The spire of the church of Saint-Étienne-du-Mont rises in the distance, and we see a jumble of shops and dwellings. Lepère’s image of this Parisian street comments on the modern city as a place where social classes commingle. What does it mean to see a place of learning as a place of work? Historical sources such as city records and newspaper accounts can help us reconstruct the social fabric of this Parisian neighborhood and understand Lepère’s place within it. These sources allow us to more fully understand the meaning of Lepère's art within its social and institutional context.