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Jacques-Henri Lartigue
Jacques Henri Lartigue (; 13 June 1894 – 12 September 1986) was a French photographer and painter, known for his photographs of automobile races, planes and female Parisian fashion models. Biography Born in Courbevoie in western Paris to a wealthy family, Lartigue started taking photographs when he was seven. He photographed his friends and family at play – running and jumping; racing home-built race cars; making kites, gliders as well as aeroplanes; and climbing the Eiffel Tower. He was one of the first artists to use the Kodak Brownie camera for snapshots. He also photographed sport events, such as the Coupe Gordon Bennett and the French Grand Prix, early flights of aviation pioneers such as Gabriel Voisin, Louis Blériot, Hubert Latham, Louis Paulhan and Roland Garros. He also captured in his camera, tennis players such as Suzanne Lenglen at the French Open tennis championships. Many of his initial, famous photographs were originally captured in stereo, for example ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Courbevoie
Courbevoie () is a commune located in the Hauts-de-Seine Department of the Île-de-France region of France. It is in the suburbs of the city of Paris, from the center of Paris. The centre of Courbevoie is situated from the city limits of Paris. La Défense, a business district hosting the tallest buildings in the metropolitan area, spreads over the southern part of Courbevoie (as well as parts of Puteaux and Nanterre). Name The name Courbevoie comes from Latin ''Curva Via'' and means "curved highway", allegedly in reference to a Roman road from Paris to Normandy that made a sharp turn to climb the hill over which Courbevoie was built. Administration Courbevoie is divided into two cantons: Canton of Courbevoie-1 and Canton of Courbevoie-2. History A wooden bridge was built crossing the Seine at Courbevoie by order of King Henry IV when in 1606 his royal coach fell into the river while being transported by ferry. Rebuilt in stone during the eighteenth century, this w ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Life Magazine
''Life'' was an American magazine published weekly from 1883 to 1972, as an intermittent "special" until 1978, and as a monthly from 1978 until 2000. During its golden age from 1936 to 1972, ''Life'' was a wide-ranging weekly general-interest magazine known for the quality of its photography, and was one of the most popular magazines in the nation, regularly reaching one-quarter of the population. ''Life'' was independently published for its first 53 years until 1936 as a general-interest and light entertainment magazine, heavy on illustrations, jokes, and social commentary. It featured some of the most notable writers, editors, illustrators and cartoonists of its time: Charles Dana Gibson, Norman Rockwell and Jacob Hartman Jr. Gibson became the editor and owner of the magazine after John Ames Mitchell died in 1918. During its later years, the magazine offered brief capsule reviews (similar to those in ''The New Yorker'') of plays and movies currently running in New York City, b ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
François Truffaut
François Roland Truffaut ( , ; ; 6 February 1932 – 21 October 1984) was a French film director, screenwriter, producer, actor, and film critic. He is widely regarded as one of the founders of the French New Wave. After a career of more than 25 years, he remains an icon of the Cinema of France, French film industry, having worked on over 25 films. Truffaut's film ''The 400 Blows'' (1959) is a defining film of the French New Wave movement, and has four sequels, ''Antoine et Colette'' (1962), ''Stolen Kisses'' (1968), ''Bed and Board (1970 film), Bed and Board'' (1970), and ''Love on the Run (1979 film), Love on the Run'' (1979). Truffaut's 1973 film ''Day for Night (film), Day for Night'' earned him critical acclaim and several awards, including the BAFTA Award for Best Film and the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film. His other notable films include ''Shoot the Piano Player'' (1960), ''Jules and Jim'' (1962), ''The Soft Skin'' (1964), ''The Wild Child'' (1970), ''T ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Robert Bresson
Robert Bresson (; 25 September 1901 – 18 December 1999) was a French film director. Known for his ascetic approach, Bresson contributed notably to the art of cinema; his non-professional actors, Ellipsis (narrative device), ellipses, and sparse use of scoring have led his works to be regarded as preeminent examples of Minimalism, minimalist film. Much of his work is known for being tragic in story and nature. Bresson is among the most highly regarded filmmakers of all time. He has the highest number of films (seven) that made the 2012 ''Sight & Sound'' critics' poll of the 250 greatest films ever made. His works ''A Man Escaped'' (1956), ''Pickpocket (film), Pickpocket'' (1959) and ''Au Hasard Balthazar'' (1966) were ranked among the top 100, and other films like ''Mouchette'' (1967) and ''L'Argent (1983 film), L'Argent'' (1983) also received many votes. Jean-Luc Godard once wrote, "He is the French cinema, as Fyodor Dostoevsky, Dostoevsky is the Russian novel and Mozart is ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Abel Gance
Abel Gance (; born Abel Eugène Alexandre Péréthon; 25 October 188910 November 1981) was a French film director and producer, writer and actor. A pioneer in the theory and practice of montage, he is best known for three major silent films: ''J'accuse'' (1919), ''La Roue'' (1923), and ''Napoléon'' (1927). Early life Born in Paris in 1889, Abel Gance was the illegitimate son of a prosperous doctor, Abel Flamant, and a working-class mother, Françoise Péréthon (or Perthon). Initially taking his mother's name, he was brought up until the age of eight by his maternal grandparents in the coal-mining town of Commentry in central France. He then returned to Paris to rejoin his mother, who had by then married Adolphe Gance, a chauffeur and mechanic, whose name Abel then adopted. Although he later fabricated the history of a brilliant school career and middle-class background, Gance left school at the age of 14, and the love of literature and art which sustained him throughout his l ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Jacques Feyder
Jacques Feyder (; 21 July 1885 – 24 May 1948) was a Belgian actor, screenwriter and film director who worked principally in France, but also in the US, Britain and Germany. He was a director of silent films during the 1920s, and in the 1930s he became associated with the style of poetic realism in Cinema of France, French cinema. He adopted French nationality in 1928. Career Born Jacques Léon Louis Frédérix in Ixelles, Belgium, he was educated at the École régimentaire in Nivelles, and was destined for a military career. At age twenty-five however he moved to Paris where he pursued an interest in acting, first on stage and then in film, adopting the name Jacques Feyder. He joined the Gaumont Film Company and in 1914 he became an assistant director with Gaston Ravel. He started directing films for Gaumont in 1916, but his career was interrupted by service with the Belgian army during 1917-1919. After the end of the war, he returned to filmmaking and quickly built a re ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Jean Cocteau
Jean Maurice Eugène Clément Cocteau (, , ; 5 July 1889 – 11 October 1963) was a French poet, playwright, novelist, designer, filmmaker, visual artist and critic. He was one of the foremost creatives of the surrealist, avant-garde, and Dadaist movements; and one of the most influential figures in early 20th-century art as a whole. The ''National Observer'' suggested that, “of the artistic generation whose daring gave birth to Twentieth Century Art, Cocteau came closest to being a Renaissance man.” He is best known for his novels ''Le Grand Écart'' (1923), ''Le Livre blanc'' (1928), and '' Les Enfants Terribles'' (1929); the stage plays ''La Voix Humaine'' (1930), '' La Machine Infernale'' (1934), ''Les Parents terribles'' (1938), '' La Machine à écrire'' (1941), and ''L'Aigle à deux têtes'' (1946); and the films ''The Blood of a Poet'' (1930), ''Les Parents Terribles'' (1948), ''Beauty and the Beast'' (1946), ''Orpheus'' (1950), and ' ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Pablo Picasso
Pablo Ruiz Picasso (25 October 1881 – 8 April 1973) was a Spanish painter, sculptor, printmaker, ceramicist and Scenic design, theatre designer who spent most of his adult life in France. One of the most influential artists of the 20th century, he is known for co-founding the Cubist movement, the invention of Assemblage (art), constructed sculpture, the co-invention of collage, and for the wide variety of styles that he helped develop and explore. Among his most famous works are the Proto-Cubism, proto-Cubist ''Les Demoiselles d'Avignon'' (1907), and the anti-war painting ''Guernica (Picasso), Guernica'' (1937), Guernica (Picasso)#Composition, a dramatic portrayal of the bombing of Guernica by German and Italian air forces during the Spanish Civil War. Picasso demonstrated extraordinary artistic talent in his early years, painting in a naturalistic manner through his childhood and adolescence. During the first decade of the 20th century, his style changed as he experimente ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Kees Van Dongen
Cornelis Theodorus Maria "Kees" van Dongen (26 January 1877 – 28 May 1968) was a Dutch-French painter who was one of the leading Fauvism, Fauves. Van Dongen's early work was influenced by the Hague School and symbolism and it evolved gradually into a rough pointillist style. From 1905 onwards – when he took part at the controversial 1905 Salon d'Automne exhibition – his style became more and more radical in its use of form and colour. The paintings he made in the period of 1905–1910 are considered by some to be his most important works. The themes of his work from that period are predominantly centered on the nightlife; he paints dancers, singers, masquerades, and theatre. Van Dongen gained a reputation for his sensuous – at times garish – portraits of especially women. Life and work Kees van Dongen was born in Delfshaven, then on the outskirts, and today a borough, of Rotterdam. He was the second of four children in a middle-class family. In 1892, at age 16, Kees va ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Yvonne Printemps
Yvonne Printemps (; born Yvonne Wigniolle; 25 July 1894 – 19 January 1977) was a French singer and actress who achieved stardom on stage and screen in France and internationally. Printemps went on the stage in Paris at the age of 12, and at 21 she was singled out by the actor, director and playwright Sacha Guitry as a leading lady. In 1919 they were married, and worked closely together until 1932, when they divorced. Printemps never remarried, but had a personal and professional partnership with the actor Pierre Fresnay which lasted until his death in 1975. As a performer, Printemps was famed for the quality of her singing voice and for her personal charm. Among those who composed for her were André Messager, Reynaldo Hahn, Noël Coward and Francis Poulenc. Her voice could have led her to an operatic career, but guided by Guitry she concentrated on operette and other types of musical show, along with non-musical plays and films. In addition to her many successes in Paris ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Sacha Guitry
Alexandre-Pierre Georges "Sacha" Guitry (; 21 February 188524 July 1957) was a French stage actor, film actor, director, screenwriter, and playwright of the boulevard theatre. He was the son of a leading French actor, Lucien Guitry, and followed his father into the theatrical profession. He became known for his stage performances, particularly in boulevardier roles. He was also a prolific playwright, writing 115 plays throughout his career. He was married five times, always to rising actresses whose careers he furthered. Probably his best-known wife was Yvonne Printemps to whom he was married between 1919 and 1932. Guitry's plays range from historical dramas to contemporary light comedies. Some have musical scores, by composers including André Messager and Reynaldo Hahn. When silent films became popular Guitry avoided them, finding the lack of spoken dialogue fatal to dramatic impact. From the 1930s to the end of his life he enthusiastically embraced the cinema, making as many ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
1924 Summer Olympics
The 1924 Summer Olympics (french: Jeux olympiques d'été de 1924), officially the Games of the VIII Olympiad (french: Jeux de la VIIIe olympiade) and also known as Paris 1924, were an international multi-sport event held in Paris, France. The opening ceremony was held on 5 July, but some competitions had already started on 4 May. The Games were the second to be hosted by Paris (after 1900), making it the first city to host the Olympics twice. The selection process for the 1924 Summer Olympics consisted of six bids, and Paris was selected ahead of Amsterdam, Barcelona, Los Angeles, Prague, and Rome. The selection was made at the 20th IOC Session in Lausanne in 1921. The cost of these Games was estimated to be 10,000,000 F. With total receipts at 5,496,610F, the Olympics resulted in a hefty loss despite crowds that reached up to 60,000 in number daily. The United States won the most gold and overall medals, having 229 athletes competing compared to France's 401. Highlights * The ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
