[Motor Car on Mountain Road, France]

Jacques-Henri Lartigue French

Not on view

Lartigue made this bird's eye view of a friend's motor car skidding around a mountain curve on November 9, 1915. Twenty years old and recently discharged from the army for physical unfitness, Lartigue and Jacques Dupuis (the car driver) had each purchased Bugatti-designed Peugeots and set out for the south of France to race their cars and escape the realities of war. On a rough road in the mountains near Nice, Lartigue set a visual trap like a sharpshooter dug into a hillside, effectively picking off his quarry racing up the hill. Few artists of any era recorded such unfettered, pure physical pleasure with a camera (or an automobile) as did Lartigue. The print is a rarity, having been made by the artist himself, a half century prior to his public recognition.

[Motor Car on Mountain Road, France], Jacques-Henri Lartigue (French, Courbevoie 1894–1986 Nice), Gelatin silver print

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