Henri Le Secq

Artist of Paris
Henri Le Secq
1851

Henri Le Secq was a French painter who learned photography and the wax paper negative process from his friend Gustave Le Gray. The wax paper process produced a negative with a thin coat of wax to make it smooth and giving the photographer the option to make as many prints of one photo as he chose.
In 1851 Le Secq was one of the founding members of the first photographic organizations of the world, the Societe Heliographique. Around the same time he and five other photographers were sent throughout France to document arcitectual monuments, mostly cathedrals, with photographs. He used cameras capable of producing large format pictures in the size of 51cm by 74cm to capture his work.
Henri gave up photography sometime after 1856 but he always believed photography was a tool for the painter and would use photographs to prepare for paintings. Sometime around 1870 he feared his photographs were starting to fade and so he began reprinting his famous photos in cyanotype to preserve them.
I find it interesting how a painter and sculptor who used photography as prep work for his art could take such amazing pictures of French architect and just abruptly give it up and go back to painting. In just a few short years he left his mark on the world with his photographs and made sure to preserve them even years later. He was a true artist in my optinion.



Thanks!!!
Angi

Do not go where the path may lead, go instead where there is no path and
leave a trail. - Ralph Waldo Emerson