Gaspard-Félix Tournachon (French:[ɡaspaʁfelikstuʁnaʃɔ̃]; 5 April 1820 – 20 March 1910[1]), known by the pseudonymNadar (French:[nadaʁ]) orFélix Nadar, was a French photographer, caricaturist, journalist, novelist and balloonist who was a proponent ofheavier-than-air flight. In 1858, he became the first person to takeaerial photographs.[2] Photographic portraits by Nadar are held by many of the great national collections of photographs. His son,Paul Nadar, continued the studio after his death.
Gaspard-Félix Tournachon (also known as Nadar)[3] was born in early April 1820 in Paris,[4] though some sources state he was born inLyon. His father,Victor Tournachon, was a printer and bookseller. Nadar began to study medicine but quit for economic reasons after his father's death.[5][4]
Nadar started working as a caricaturist and novelist for various newspapers. He fell in with the Parisian bohemian group ofGérard de Nerval,Charles Baudelaire, andThéodore de Banville. His friends picked a nickname for him, perhaps by a playful habit of adding "dar" to the end of words, Tournadar, which later became Nadar.[5] His work was published inLe Charivari for the first time in 1848. In 1849, he foundedLa Revue Comique à l'Usage des Gens Sérieux. He also editedLe Petit Journal pour Rire.[4]
Nadar's studio at 35 Boulevard des Capucines in 1860.
From work as a caricaturist, he moved on to photography. He took his first photographs in 1853, and in 1854 opened a photographic studio at 113 rue St. Lazare.[5] In 1860 he moved to 35 Boulevard des Capucines. Nadar photographed a wide range of personalities: politicians (Guizot,Proudhon), stage actors (Sarah Bernhardt,Paulus), writers (Hugo,Baudelaire,Sand,Nerval,Gautier,Dumas), painters (Corot,Delacroix,Millet), and musicians (Liszt,Rossini,Offenbach,Verdi,Berlioz).[5] Portrait photography was going through a period of native industrialization, and Nadar refused to use the traditional sumptuous decors; he preferred natural daylight and despised what he considered to be unnecessary accessories. In 1886, with his son Paul, he did what may be the first photo-report: an interview with the great scientistMichel Eugène Chevreul, who at the time was 100 years old.[6] It was published inLe Journal Illustré.[5]
BalloonLe Geant flown by Gaspard-Félix Tournachon (Nadar), 1863Studio portrait of Nadar in a balloon basket,c. 1863
In 1858, he became the first person to takeaerial photographs. This was done using thewet plate collodion process, and since the plates had to be prepared and developed (a process that required a chemically neutral setting) while the basket was aloft, Nadar experienced imaging problems as gas escaped from his balloons. After Nadar invented a gas-proof cotton cover and draped it over his balloon baskets, he was able to capture stable images.[7]: 159 He also pioneered the use of artificial lighting in photography, working in the catacombs of Paris. He was thus the first person to photograph from the air with his balloons, as well as the first to photograph underground, in theCatacombs of Paris.[4] In 1867, he published the first magazine to focus on air travel:L'Aéronaute.[4]
Nadar élevant la Photographie à la hauteur de l'Art ("Nadar elevating Photography to Art"). Lithograph byHonoré Daumier.
In 1863, Nadar commissioned the prominent balloonistEugène Godard to construct an enormous balloon, 60 metres (196 ft) high and with a capacity of 6,000 m3 (210,000 ft3), and namedLe Géant (The Giant).[7]: 164 On his visit toBrussels withLe Géant, on 26 September 1864, Nadar erected mobile barriers to keep the crowd at a safe distance.Crowd control barriers are still known in Belgium asNadar barriers.[4]Le Géant was badly damaged at the end of its second flight, but Nadar rebuilt the gondola and the envelope, and continued his flights. In 1867, he was able to take as many as a dozen passengers aloft at once, serving cold chicken and wine.[8]
For publicity, he recreated balloon flights in his studio with his wife, Ernestine, using a rigged-up balloon gondola.[9] He stayed a passionate aeronaut until he and Ernestine were injured in an accident inLe Géant.[10]
Le Géant (The Giant) inspiredJules Verne'sFive Weeks in a Balloon. Nadar was the inspiration for the character ofMichael Ardan in Verne'sFrom the Earth to the Moon.[7]: 164 [11][5] In 1862, Verne and Nadar established aSociété pour la recherche de la navigation aérienne, which later becameLa Société d'encouragement de la locomotion aérienne au moyen du plus lourd que l'air (The Society for the Encouragement of Aerial Locomotion by Means of Heavier than Air Machines).[8]: 123 Nadar served as president and Verne as secretary.[12]
During theSiege of Paris in 1870–71, Nadar was instrumental in organising balloon flights carrying mail to reconnect the besieged Parisians with the rest of the world, thus establishing the world's firstairmail service.[7]: 260 [5][8]
In April 1874, he lent his photo studio to a group of painters to present thefirst exhibition of theImpressionists.[13] He photographedVictor Hugo on his death-bed in 1885.[14] He is credited with having published (in 1886) the firstphoto-interview (of famous chemistMichel Eugène Chevreul, then a centenarian).[6] His photographs of women are notable for their natural poses and individual character.[15] Nadar was recognized for breaking the conventions of photographicportrait, choosing to capture the subjects as active participants.[16]
As of 1 April 1895, Nadar turned over the Paris Nadar Studio to his son Paul. He moved toMarseille, where he established another photography studio in 1897. On 3 January 1909 he returned to Paris.[17]
Nadar died on 20 March 1910, aged 89. He was buried inPère Lachaise Cemetery in Paris. The studio continued under the direction of his son and long-term collaborator, Paul Nadar (1856–1939).[18]
Towards the end of his life, Nadar publishedQuand j'étais photographe, which was translated into English and published by MIT Press in 2015. The book is full of both anecdotes and samples of his photography, including many portraits of recognizable names.[19][20]
The painterJean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres sent some of his clients to Nadar to have their photographs taken as studies for his paintings.[21]
Nadar's son (center) with Yatsu Kanshiro (left) and an unnamed samurai (right), photographed by Nadar. They were members of theSecond Japanese Embassy to Europe in 1863.
^Hambourg, Maria Morris (1995).Nadar. Metropolitan Museum of Art. pp. 50–51.ISBN9780810964891. Retrieved12 November 2019.
^Smith, Ian Haydn (2018).The short story of photography : a pocket guide to key genres, works, themes & techniques. London: Laurence King Publishing.ISBN978-1-78627-201-0.OCLC1002114117.
^Nadar, Félix (6 November 2015).When I Was a Photographer. Translated by Cadava, Eduardo; Theodoratou, Liana (1st English translation ed.). MIT Press. pp. 234–235.ISBN9780262330725. Retrieved12 November 2019.
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