as the representation of the end of France’sbelle
e ́poque. Lartigue’s photographs, while taken to pre-
serve his memories, now function as documents that
record an era rather than simply a life.
Most of Lartigue’s early photographs record
events and people at his home. Lartigue’s first
photograph is a fairly typical family portrait that
he took on a 1318-cm plate camera in 1902. His
aunt, uncle, and cousin stand at the left of the
group, and his parents along with his brother Maur-
ice (Zissou) and another child named Marcelle, who
holds a kitten, stand at the right of the group. His
aunt leans forward to steady his cousin who sits on
a tricycle. The photograph was taken outdoors and
the windows of the family home are visible behind
the people. Although he was to take many photo-
graphs of the people close to him, this is one of the
few straight portraits that Lartigue took. Many of
his pictures of people capture them in less typical
poses, often in movement.
Lartigue’s father continued to give his son new
cameras and by 1904 he was able to take snapshots
with his Gaumont Block Notes camera. The faster
shutter speed of this camera allowed Lartigue to
capture movement. Movement seemed to appear
everywhere in the Lartigue household. He pho-
tographed his nanny, Dudu, throwing a ball into
the air, and Zizi, his cat, leaping into the air for a
toy. In another photograph, a family member hurlsa
cushion out of a second-story window. Siblings,
cousins, and even adults appear engaged in playful
action. These action photographs are significant, for
they demonstrate a young boy’s extraordinary abil-
ity to anticipate and capture a moment. In one par-
ticularly remarkable photograph, My Cousin
Bichonnade, Paris, 1905, Lartigue captured his cou-
sin running down an outdoor staircase. She makes
her hands into fists and raises them to chest level.
Her left knee juts forward and both her feet, which
have left the ground, are almost hidden by her long
skirt. It appears as if Bichonnade is flying. The nota-
tion in the album below the photograph reads
‘‘Photo taken with Spido-Gaumont 6 1300 (Larti-
gue, Album 1905, folio 44 recto, reproduced in Cen-
tre Pompidou,Jacques Henri Lartigue, L’Album
d’une vie/A Life’s Diary, n.p.).
Flight was one of Lartigue’s obsessions. In 1906
he wrote in his diary: ‘‘There’s one thing all of us
want to do...it’s an idea we all dream and talk
about...to get up into the air! In my sleep I can
fly...I fly all the time. I can’t get enough of it. But
once awake, I’m a little boy again’’ (Diary, Rouzat,
1906; quoted inDiary of a Century). Lartigue spent
much time recording some of the first flights and
flight-related experiments in France. There are
photographs of the family constructing his brother’s
glider, as well as balloon races in the Tuileries gar-
dens, and an image of a small Zissou, dwarfed by the
huge ‘‘Colonel Renard’’ dirigible. Lartigue watched
and photographed many of the early airplane
experiments that were conducted at the Issy-les-
Moulineaux airfield. The names of significant fig-
ures in the history of French aviation appear in his
diary and in the captions below his photographs:
Gabriel Voisin, Ame ́rigo, Le ́on Delagrange. Not
only do these photographs record some of the first
airplanes, they are also beautiful compositions that
express a young man’s fascination with flight at a
time when it still seemed unreal. Mathieu in a
Farman, Issy-les-Moulineaux, January 1911shows
a flat, almost empty airfield. At the very top of the
frame a plane floats, sideways, its silhouette like an
eagle. It hangs there as if by magic. In the lower half
of the frame we see a couple walking their baby in a
pram, and all three turn their heads to watch a
biplane leave the ground. InAudemars in a Ble ́riot
aeroplane, Vichy, September 1912, a sea of hats tilts
upwards to watch a small, primitive-looking plane
that swoops in from just above the tops of the trees.
By taking the photograph from within the crowd,
Lartigue captured the sense of wonder and excite-
ment that must have come with these early flights.
The young Lartigue was also captivated by
another invention of the era—the automobile. In
addition to the many family photographs depicting
his father’s cars, or family members dressed in riding
outfits, Lartigue also photographed automobile
races. As with the photographs of family members
playing around his home, Lartigue focused on cap-
turing movement. Here, at the races, the challenge
was to capture speed. Lartigue did this remarkably
well in his most well-known photographDelage
Automobile, A.C.F. Grand Prix, Dieppe Circuit,
June 26, 1912. A car races so fast out of the picture
frame that its wheels become distorted ovals. The
onlookers appear to lean in the other direction,
expressing tension between the speed of the car
and the immobility of the people. Everything in
the image is blurred except the body of the car and
its driver and passenger. While many of Lartigue’s
other images capture the excitement of the races by
showing the track, the crowd, and groups of cars,
none captures speed so perfectly.
In addition to depicting the inventions of the early
twentieth century, Lartigue also photographed the
fashion of that period. In a series of photographs
taken in 1911 and 1912 on the fashionable, bour-
geois streets of Paris—Avenue de Bois de Boulogne
and the Avenue des Acacias—Lartigue caught the
image of society’se ́le ́gantes. The women are dressedLARTIGUE, JACQUES HENRI