Pont en Royans 1857 - 1861

Edouard Baldus’s 1857-1861 “Pont en Royans” is a striking example of 19th-century landscape photography. It showcases the technical mastery of the calotype process, resulting in a crisp and detailed image of a bridge nestled within a narrow gorge. The photograph, housed at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, captures the natural grandeur of the French countryside and emphasizes the architectural integration into the surrounding landscape. Baldus, a pioneer of the art form, is known for his contributions to the development of landscape photography in France, particularly through his documentation of bridges, which reflected the burgeoning infrastructure of the industrial era.