Versailles, Coin de Parc 1902

This toned silver print, "Versailles, Coin de Parc," was created by Eugène Atget sometime in the late 19th or early 20th century. You know, Atget just trundled around Paris with his big camera, kind of like a methodical flâneur, documenting the city as it was. And here, it's all about atmosphere. Look at the way the light is caught in the still water of the fountain, reflecting the overcast sky and bare branches of the trees. It's muted, almost melancholic, but not in a sad way. More like a quiet observation of a space and a time. Atget wasn't trying to make grand statements. Instead, he seemed to be interested in the humble, the everyday, the stuff that often gets overlooked. Like this little corner of the park at Versailles, a place of faded glory, captured with such tenderness. Thinking about this image, I'm reminded of the early photographs of Fox Talbot, but somehow Atget takes the image into a world of his own. It's like he's saying, "Hey, look at this," and in doing so, he shows us how much beauty there is in the ordinary.