Description: west facade of cathedral with scaffolding at right and on south side, 2 horse-drawn carraiges in front of central portal
Label Text: The cathedral of Notre-Dame is the emblem of "Old Paris" celebrated in Victor Hugo's famous novel of 1831. Vandalized during the Revolution, the Gothic church was desperately in need of repair when restorations began in 1845. The restorer, Viollet-le-Duc, wished to give the cathedral an architectural unity of style that it had never possessed. He removed many of the surrounding structures, quadrupling the size of the plaza in front, in order to emphasize the church's height. Baldus's photograph of the facade of Notre-Dame shows Viollet-le-Duc's restoration work in progress and presents the monument as a surface from which valuable information about the past can be discerned.
Link to share this object record: https://museums.fivecolleges.edu/detail.php?t=objects&type=ext&id_number=AC+2000.168 |