Photography and French culture enthusiasts are invited to the Legion of Honor Museum for a lecture dedicated to the history of French photography, presented by Sally Katz-Martin, the Bay Area’s most francophile curator.
As part of the A Closer Look lecture series, the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco present a fascinating exploration titled Eternal Paris and French Photography. This talk invites the public to discover how French photographers of the 19th and early 20th centuries used the camera to capture, celebrate, and preserve Paris’s cultural identity. The images featured in the lecture are drawn from the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco’s own collection, which includes significant works of French photography.
At a time when photography was emerging as a major artistic medium, Paris became both subject, setting, and visual laboratory. Photographers immortalized its streets, monuments, and daily life, helping construct the mythical image of the French capital as we know it today.
This lecture offers a deeper understanding of how these images helped shape the city’s visual memory and spread a particular idea of Paris around the world—at the crossroads of modernity, heritage, and urban poetry.
An ideal opportunity for lovers of art history, photography, and French culture to explore the origins of a photographic gaze that continues to influence contemporary artists.
A Closer Look: Eternal Paris and French Photography
Date: Saturday, March 14, 2026 at 1:00 pm
Address: Legion of Honor Museum – Gunn Theater – San Francisco
Free admission (first come first serve) More info
Merci Sally!
