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Eugene
Atget documented Paris from 1888 until his death in 1927. Like many
people, I consider him to have been the greatest photographer of all
time. Atget straightforwardly documented the city with photographs that
give you the feeling that all the transitory things that people do and
are have washed away, leaving onlytheir transcendent accomplishments.
On a 1989 trip to Paris, I suddenly found myself face to face with a
spiral-topped gatepost that I knew very well from a beautiful
photograph by Atget (the photograph on the left). I rephotographed his
gatepost from memory (the photograph on the right) and wondered how
many other Atget subjects might still be holding their poses.
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