Le Château de Clisson (Loire-Atlantique)
Henri Marie Pierre de La Blanchère French
Not on view
Rather than a hulking medieval pile, the Château de Clisson appears in Henri de la Blanchère’s carefully composed photograph as an integral part of its Breton landscape. Situated on the right bank of the Sèvre Nantaise, the thirteenth-century castle was transformed by the sculptor François-Frédéric Lemot, who purchased the estate in 1807 and turned it into a Romantic folly. The picturesque site attracted numerous artists, including La Blanchère. A polymath who learned photography from Gustave Le Gray, he was also a landscape painter and noted ichthyologist. The author of numerous articles and books, he is known for his architectural views made from paper negatives, portraits, and studies of fish (especially stereoscopic views) from collodion on glass.
