Gezicht op de aanleg van het Viaduc d'Auteuil over de Seine bij Point-du-Jour before 1865

Hippolyte-Auguste Collard made this albumen silver print, titled "View of the construction of the Viaduc d'Auteuil over the Seine at Point-du-Jour," in France. It pictures what we now call civil engineering, and it allows us to reflect on how the institutions of art have expanded over time. In this image, Collard records the physical labor required for a project of this magnitude; it depicts the social conditions that shaped artistic production at the time. There are men constructing a bridge, with a pile of rocks in the foreground, and barges in the Seine. The image is a cultural record of Paris's transformation during the Second Empire. Collard worked for the Ponts et Chaussées, the state administration for bridges and roads. He made an archive of photographs documenting this time of rapid modernization. To fully understand such an image, historians might consult engineering records, city archives, and social histories of Parisian workers. The image encourages us to think about the relationship between art, labor, and institutional power.