EXHIBITION – GIVEN MOMENTS

A major retrospective dedicated to French photographer Robert Doisneau is on view at the Maillol Museum until October 12, 2025.

More than 350 photographs have been carefully selected for the exhibition “Instants Donnés“ (“Given Moments”), from the 450,000 images that make up the museum’s collection.

A “patient passerby”, Robert Doisneau, with his Rolleiflex held at chest level, became a sometimes melancholic, sometimes joyful, but always poetic witness of his time. He sought out anecdotes and small stories, and his photographs are often filled with humor, irony, and tenderness.

Born in 1912 in Gentilly, a suburb of Paris, Doisneau became, alongside Willy Ronis, one of the main representatives of the humanist photography movement of the 20th century.

Arguably the most quintessentially Parisian of photographers, he turned Paris into his playground, capturing for nearly half a century thousands of portraits of the city’s working-class people – artisans, street kids, vagrants, and lovers.

Les Glâneurs de Charbon, 1945

Madame Titine campe sur le quai de l’Arsenal, 1950

Monsieur Ali à Vitry, 1965

Le Baron William et son laquais, Paris, 1955

Les Frères, rue du Docteur Lecène, Paris, 1934

La Dernière Valse du 14 Juillet, Paris, 1949

Les chagrins de la récré, Paris, 1956

Le Justicier de la Porte de Vanves, Paris, 1956

La Sonnette, Paris, 1934

Timide à Lunettes, Paris, 1956

He photographed the Occupation in Paris without fear, as he was working for the newspaper Le Point. His images bear witness to the harshness of life under the Occupation: families sheltering in metro corridors during bombings, a grocer weighing a microscopic ration of butter, an identity check by the police in 1944. He would soon go on to capture the joy of Liberation.

He also helped protect persecuted individuals during this time, using his talents both as a photographer and as a forger.

After WWII, he became a freelance photographer. Still, he accepted one final and significant assignment for Le Point: a photographic tribute to the underground printers of the Occupation, with whom he had always maintained strong ties.

It was the writer Blaise Cendrars who first recognized Doisneau’s talent. In 1949, he invited him to co-author La Banlieue de Paris.

Gentilly, 1943

Au Bon Coin, Saint Denis, 1945

Le Vélo du Printemps, Alfortville, 1948

Mission DATAR 1984, Cité des Beaudottes, Sevran

Entrée de la Zone, Gentilly, 1945

Mission DATAR 1984, Saint Denis depuis la Tour Pleyel, Juin 1984

Mission DATAR 1984, Mur à pêches et Cité de l’Amitié, Montreuil-sous-bois

Mission DATAR 1984, Quartier du Pavé Neuf, Noisy-le-Grand

The book was a great success. Yet Doisneau declined all honors.

I don’t like honors. Only lion tamers are decorated. As for tightrope walkers, a medal would make them lose their balance.”

Doisneau photographed everything: Vogue models, the miners of Lens, and his artist friends.

Drapé de Grès, Paris, 1955

Baiser Volé, 1950

Bal Besteigui, Venise, 1951

Jacques Prévert

Marguerite Duras, 1955

Sempé, 1963

His black and white photography is legendary – it was less an artistic choice than a purely economic one – black and white was cheaper than color – and it’s not so much his magazine photos but his street photography that stands out for its human depth.