Berenice Abbott

In hindsight, I wish I had more carefully documented the passage of the organ grinder that I saw earlier this week. A reader reminded me just how rare these sightings are. . .
The careful documentation of a changing city was the theme of a photography exhibition that we attended earlier this week. The Jeu de Paume is presenting a retrospective of the works of Berenice Abbott (1898-1991), an American photographer who spent several years in Paris in the 1920s where she was influenced by the work of Eugene Atget.

Abbott is best known for her series Changing New York (1935-1939) in which she systematically photographed the city. She captured not only NYC architecture, but a way of life that was disappearing - like organ grinders.

Here are a few representative images from the exhibit at the Jeu de Paume:

For more details on the exposition at the Jeu de Paume click here. And the Museum of the City of New York has over 1600 of Abbot's images online here.