Emile Joachim Constant Puyo, “Montmartre, 1906” – Favorite and Noteworthy Photographs 2014 #10

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Figure 1 - Emile Joachim Constant Puyo, Montmartre, ca. 1906. This is one of the images featured in the MFA exhibit on Pictorialism. This image is from the Wikimediacommons and from the Metropolitan Museum of Art in NYC. In the public domain in the United States because it is more than 75 yrs. old.

Figure 1 – Emile Joachim Constant Puyo, Montmartre, ca. 1906. This is one of the images featured in the MFA exhibit on Pictorialism. This image is from the Wikimediacommons and from the Metropolitan Museum of Art in NYC. In the public domain in the United States because it is more than 75 yrs. old.

Drum roll, please.  This year’s Favorite and Noteworthy Photograph #10, the winner, and the last image on Hati and Skoll for the year 2014 is Emile Joachim Constant Puyo, “Montmartre, 1906.” I have spoken about this image before.  I saw it earlier this year at an exhibit at Bostons Museum of Fine Arts and fell immediately in love with it.  The image is truly stunning and represents bromoil printing at the glorious high point of photographic pictoralism.  The diffuse pointillism of the image closely mirrors contemporary impressionism.  The foggy vision of the Sacré-Cœur Basilica is amazing and quite magical. And then there is the enigma. Exactly what is the young woman looking at on the street below?