[Stairway, Eiffel Tower, Paris]
Rather than emphasize the vertical height of the Eiffel Tower or its iconic status, Bing’s photograph plunges us into the dizzying midst of its iron frame. Stairs and beams run at unexpected angles to one another, intersecting and overlapping to create visual pulls in countervailing directions. Three figures, facing in opposite directions, underscore this sense of fragmented space and centrifugal energy. Like other photographers in Germany and France during these years, Bing makes use of unconventional viewpoints, angling her camera skyward to foreground the visual nature of urban experience in the modern metropolis.
Artwork Details
- Title: [Stairway, Eiffel Tower, Paris]
- Artist: Ilse Bing (German, 1899–1998)
- Date: 1931
- Medium: Gelatin silver print
- Dimensions: 22.3 x 28.2 cm (8 3/4 x 11 1/8 in.)
- Classification: Photographs
- Credit Line: Ford Motor Company Collection, Gift of Ford Motor Company and John C. Waddell, 1987
- Object Number: 1987.1100.336
- Rights and Reproduction: © Estate of Ilse Bing
- Curatorial Department: Photographs
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Ilse Bing
1931
Ilse Bing
1930
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1934
Ilse Bing
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Ilse Bing
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