Gezicht op Parijs met de Eiffeltoren en de Seine 1890 - 1898

Edouard Hautecoer captured this view of Paris with the Eiffel Tower and the Seine in a photograph sometime between the late 19th and early 20th centuries. The photograph presents a wide angle shot of Paris which seems to celebrate the modern city. The Eiffel Tower, a symbol of industrial progress, pierces the skyline. It's hard to ignore how the Seine, once a crucial artery for trade and transport, now seems to be a picturesque element in the urban landscape. The wide boulevards, lined with trees, hint at the reshaping of Paris under Haussmann, intended to modernize the city, but also to control its population. Who was included in this vision of modernity, and who was excluded? What did progress mean to the working-class residents displaced by these grand urban schemes? This photograph invites us to consider the complex relationship between progress, power, and representation in the rapidly changing city of Paris.