Percement de l'avenue de l'Opéra: Butte des Moulins (Construction of the avenue de l'Opéra: Butte des Moulins)

December 1876
On view at The Met Fifth Avenue in Gallery 691
On loan to The Met
This work of art is currently on loan to the museum.
The Butte des Moulins (“windmill hill”) was a small hill—part natural, part built up—that had existed in Paris since ancient times. Dotted with windmills, the working-class neighborhood was dominated by small trades until the mid-1870s, when its population was cleared and the hill was leveled to construct the avenue de l’Opéra, which would become celebrated as the most glamorous street in Paris.

Artwork Details

Object Information
  • Title: Percement de l'avenue de l'Opéra: Butte des Moulins (Construction of the avenue de l'Opéra: Butte des Moulins)
  • Artist: Charles Marville (French, Paris 1813–1879 Paris)
  • Date: December 1876
  • Medium: Albumen silver print from glass negative
  • Dimensions:

    image: 20.5 x 36.1 cm (8 1/16 x 14 3/16 in.)

  • Classification: Photographs
  • Credit Line: Musée Carnavalet, Paris
  • Curatorial Department: Photographs