Réunion des Tuileries au Louvre, album 4 1854 - 1857

This is the fourth album from a series of photographs, assembled into leather bound albums, of the 1850s construction of the New Louvre in Paris by Edouard Baldus. Commissioned by Napoleon III, these albums immortalized the connection of the Louvre Palace to the Tuileries Palace. This was a key project to assert imperial power through the control of urban space and vision. The albums were presented as diplomatic gifts, a symbol of French progress and imperial vision. Photography was still a relatively new technology at this time. Baldus uses it here not just to document, but to celebrate and promote the ambitions of the Second Empire. The opulent binding, with its imperial crest, speaks to the political function of this album as propaganda. Understanding this work fully requires archival research into the urban planning of Paris under Napoleon III, the politics of photography in the 19th century, and the role of the Louvre as a symbol of French power.