Remaking Urban Space

Baron Haussmann and the Rebuilding of Paris, 1851-1870

by Michael Adcock, who teaches French history at the Department of History, the University of Melbourne

he Paris that the modern vis- of his personal study in the Tuileries itor enjoys today - the Paris Palace show that it was dominated by a Tof broad boulevards and large master plan of Paris, across which monumental vistas - is essentially the he had drawn the broad outlines of his city that was transformed in one intense, proposed rebuilding, emphasising new centrally-planned campaign of rebuild- roads and boulevards. It may seem sur- ing during the Second Empire (1852- prising that a man who had spent most 1871), with some projects being com- of his life in exile, and who consequent- pleted in the early years of the Third ly did not know Paris very well - he had Republic (1871-1940). to ask his way to the Place des Vosges when he first returned ]. - should con- There is a vision of Paris that domi- ceive such a bold plan to remodel the nates our perception of the capital today, city; paradoxically, this is probably why and that is the alluring image of the he could do so, because anybody more refurbished city as it appeared in the last George Haussmann, familiar with the city would have been decades of the 19th century, recorded by the engineer from the provinces daunted by the dense accretion of some a generation of painters who became Impressionists, and who recorded differ- 2,000 years of urban history. enamoured of the new perspectives of ent aspects of the city: Jean Beraud, for urban space. We have inherited literally example, was a sophisticated, rather Napoleon III's grand vision required hundreds of images which convey their slick, chronicler of fashionable society, the services of a capable engineer who sense of excitement, of a new ease and and used a highly polished style to had the boldness and the flair to trans- sophistication, generated by the new record his interest in the new social pos- late the plan into reality. The existing urban spaces. Camille Pissarro's Le sibilities of public space. Prefect of Paris, Berger, proved to be Boulevard Montmartre (1897, National too cautious, and too half-hearted, and Gallery of Victoria), for example, seeks These charming images show us, was dismissed in 1853. The emperor to express the dynamic, varied, fast- then, the Paris that was created by the then made a choice that would prove to moving quality of modern life by means Second Empire, but they do not show us be inspired: he chose a young, but not of the reduction of solid forms into the the Paris of the Second Empire. The completely unknown, engineer from the briefest notation in dabs of paint. Paris of Napoleon III, the modern provinces, George Haussmann, and ele- Gustave Caillebotte's Rainy Day in metropolis celebrated by Charles vated him to the powerful position of Paris (1877, Art Institute of Chicago) Baudelaire and by Edouard Manet, was Prefect of the Seine District. There was uses a smooth, compact paint surface to a quite different city, an urban space an element of political reward here: evoke the sheeny appearance of the new convulsed by the most elemental trans- Haussmann had been an early supporter streets on a rainy day. The artist depicts formation. For most of the Second of Louis-Napoleon prior to and during bourgeois strollers who no longer share Empire, the city resembled a vast con- his coup d'etat (2nd December 1851), this suburb with all ranks of society: the struction site, wherein whole suburbs and had already been promoted to new apartment buildings behind them were demolished, new horizons were Prefect, or imperial administrator, in the are expensive, and the working people opened up, and new types of urban department of the Gironde; he was also of Paris could no longer afford to live dwellings were erected. entrusted with the role of "Special here. Commissioner to the Government", with The impulse to remake Paris on this the delicate mission of winning over the The new Paris also attracted the vast scale came from the emperor, royalist city of Bordeaux to the new attention of many artists who were not Napoleon III, himself. Surviving images regime.2 ■ The Monumental Plan The task that Napoleon III and Haussmann took on was, quite literally, gargantuan in scale. Both were, of course, familiar with monumental plan- ning: Napoleon III had studied prece- dents such as the Campidoglio in late Renaissance Rome, and had seen urban developments such as the Place des Vosges in Paris, constructed during the 17th century by King Henri IV. He had also been intrigued by the distinctive French tradition of "utopian" urban planning, in which architects such as Ledoux and Boulle created ideal cities on paper. 3 A great deal of actual urban renovation proved, however, to be uni- tary: it involved single monuments or monumental ensembles. It was one thing to clear a space in the fabric of a con- gested city and to erect a single splendid monument, but it was another to re- order the fabric of the whole city, so that single monuments could be placed in relation to each other along lines of communication and of visual access. Planning a city retrospectively, after it has developed, is a bold undertaking. A city such as Paris presented particular problems: it was not only a large city, with three times the population density of London, but was also a very compact city, because the basic unit of settlement was the apartment building. 4 Even rela- tively modest clearances of land would involve the displacement of large num- bers of people. Two of the earliest cut- tings, the Boulevard Sebastopol and the extension of the Rue de Rivoli, for example, involved the loss of some 40 streets, the demolition of 2,000 Demolition for the Avenue de l'Opera, by Ferat dwellings, and the displacement of 25,000 people. 5 enormous. Graphic artists recorded their neers used a new technology, electric It is the work of the graphic artists sense of awe at the scale of the earth lighting, to floodlight whole sites so that of the period that best captures the moving projects: Ferat's Demolition for the project could continue. The cutting extent of the alteration to the urban fab- the Avenue de l'Opera gives us some of some boulevards required the ric. Maxime Lalanne's Demolition for idea of the size of the earth-moving removal not only of the suburb that lay the Rue des Ecoles (1865, Museum of equipment, and of the tons of debris and in their path, but occasionally of land- Fine Arts, Boston), for example, depicts soil being carted away. It also reminds forms: the Boulevard de l'Opera, for the dense, compact mass of apartment us of one of the most persistent memo- example, necessitated the lowering of buildings, virtual warrens of hundreds of ries of the Parisians who lived through the terrain by several metres, in order to small dwellings, and the extent of the the upheaval: they recalled that they create the desired vista up to the Opera swathe being cut through them. seemed to be living with the smell of building at the end. In simple terms of the physical mass dust permanently in their nostrils. The This then was the fundamental of material to be moved, the project was work continued day and night: the engi- transformation of the fabric of the city, ■ and hence of the fabric of people's embodiment of the city of Paris as a to all that. The new apartments were everyday lives. It must have done con- person suffering unprecedented violence more expensive overall, and their floor siderable violence to their posed percep- and invasion. One anonymous image plans were usually identical from the tions of urban space. How did they represented Paris as Madam Lutetia ground floor to the fifth, so that there respond to the disruption? What trace Shunning the Advances of Baron was little possibility for differentiation has been left of their response to this Haussmann, the point being that the city of prices and the setting aside of cheap elemental change? is both historicised, by reference to its rooms. There were still garret rooms, classical past as Roman Lutetia, and but even these were of a higher quality feminised, by personification as an ele- than their predecessors, and they were Dealing with the gant young woman confronted with a now reserved for the domestic servants Demolition brutal suitor. A second image by Morin, of the rich bourgeois families. Was there It was left to chroniclers and artists The City of Paris Invaded by Workers, is a coherent plan to force the workers out to record some of the sense of shock even more revealing: it depicts the city of Paris? Historians seem to recoil from and disorientation. Honore Daumier, for as a woman weighed down to the such a precise accusation. There can, example, recorded the responses of ground by the weight of works being however, be little doubt that when the Parisians with real compassion: he tem- operated upon her. A female Gulliver, logic of real estate values virtually made porarily suspended his acerbic satire of she is over-run by the swarm of workers this process inevitable and ineluctable, the bourgeoisie and noted their gentle streaming in from the countryside to the propertied classes were well pleased bewilderment at the sight of a familiar take advantage of the work available on with the result. Haussmann himself was urban world literally crumbling around the construction sites. The image seems exceptionally frank in stating: to conflate a long-established fear of the them. In his lithograph, Now We Will Already suburbs that seemed Know What Sort of Flower It Is (1852, working classes as being sexually dan- gerous, and a more recent sense that the condemned to remain plunged in Bibliotheque Nationale de France, misery are being covered with sump- Paris), he depicts a peaceful bourgeois city was being taken over by the flood tuous new constructions, which can- placidly telling his wife that the demoli- of unruly workers from the countryside. not fail to attract a quite different tion of the building next door will allow If the bourgeoisie resented the inva- sort of population. 8 in more sunlight onto their window-box, sion of workers, the inverse was also so there is a chance that their little true. The working people of Paris quick- flower will bloom for the first time; ly realised that they were being dispos- The Rent Goes Up their own apartment building will, of sessed. Before 1850, the social geogra- And what of the workers? They course, be the next to be demolished. phy of Paris had been to some degree moved out, having been told that they Even more poignant is the lithograph, vertically aligned, in the sense that a should come back when the new build- Behold, Adelaide... (1853, Bibliotheque typical apartment house contained ten- ing was finished. When they returned, Nationale de France, Paris). Like the ants from a range of social classes: well- they found that their previous rents of previous work, this image dates to the to-do bourgeois families lived in the approximately 110 francs per annum time at the beginning of the long apartments on the lower floors, working had doubled, and were now unafford- process of transformation, when the folk lived higher up, and the very poor able.9 Many workers felt that the ploy sense of novelty, and of disorientation, lived in the garrets. It is true that we was deliberate: socially exclusive prices was probably most acute. In this image, should not exaggerate the degree of this were matched by discriminatory poli- the bourgeois remarks: "Behold, social integration: physical proximity of cies, and they recalled their bitterness Adelaide, there is our nuptial chamber" bourgeois and worker does not guaran- when concierges whom they had known as he points to the semi-demolished tee that there will be sympathy and for years sniffily informed them the "the apartment where they used to live. understanding, but it does at least pre- owner will not take workers any Perhaps there is a trace of the old pom- clude the complete alienation of one more". 1° A wife of a Parisian cabinet posity when he declaims: "These work- class from another. If this cosy image of maker described how her family had ers don't respect anything. They don't social integration has since been over- had to make a series of outward moves, have the cult of memory", but his sense emphasised, it was precisely because the because they no sooner found an old of the invasiveness, and particularly of modernisation of Paris caused people to apartment building with cheap rooms, the brutal disruption of the barriers look back nostalgically to a smaller- than it was demolished as part of the between public and private space, is . scale, more intimate and harmonious progressive outward spread of specula- touching and rea1. 6 Walls are the divid- city and to idealise the tenor of life tion and development. She, like many ing line between your private domain there.? others, found herself propelled to the and the public sphere, and these divi- Nonetheless, there was some degree very fringes of the expanded city, near sions were simply being torn down. of parallel occupation of the apartment the fortifications which surrounded Other images record the sense of houses of pre-1850 Paris. The Paris. 11 These suburbs, only recently shock and displacement in terms of an "Haussmannisation" of Paris put an end integrated into the city of Paris, were ■ from the outset poorly equipped with decades of our own century they would ment: that Napoleon III, struggling to civic infrastructure such as roads and have been financially impossible. legitimate his regime, wanted to make sanitation, and were certainly not the entire city into a monument to his The discussion of the fait accompli equipped to receive the influx of thou- tends also to obscure a more problemat- rule, and thus appropriate to himself the sands of workers evicted from the centre ic question, that of the intentions and traditional signifiers of grandeur and of the city. The population increase was motives of Napoleon III in embarking munificence used by previous rulers. alarming: the population of central Paris upon such an extraordinary undertaking. increased by only 21% during the sec- The third interpretation is the capi- There are four main lines of interpreta- ond Empire, whereas that of the outer talist argument: that the emperor, who tion of the impulses behind the suburbs increased by 63%. 12 forged an alliance with the industrial Haussmannisation of Paris. bourgeoisie and presided over the birth The rebuilding of Paris is such an of modem forms of enterprise such as extraordinary episode in the history of The first, and in a sense still the joint-stock companies, wanted to convert modem urban planning that its achieve- most pervasive, is the military explana- the capital so that it could serve as an ment seems almost to defy analysis of tion: that Napoleon III, himself a mili- efficient venue for capitalist enterprise. its origins. Insofar as there is discussion, tary man, was anxious to subjugate the rebellious capital to military control. it often tends to focus upon the end The fourth argument is the hygienist result: whether Paris was better off after The second is the monumental argu- argument: that the emperor, and perhaps the improvements had been made. Many contemporary observers bemoaned the destruction of old Paris, not merely because it was familiar, but because it seemed more intimate, more human in its scale, more individual in its charm. If 11 1111111-1111111111 one browses through the wonderful frgirTs lagwiLsol 111PEPAIL ree39_ ON. MIMI images of old Paris made by the photog- •■••■■■ ' • rapher Charles Marville from the 1850s onwards, one can get a sense of how human, and idiomatic, this essentially It medieval streetscape was, and how peo- ple used to such parochial closeness could have been shocked by the sudden destruction of these intimate neighbour- hoods. From their point of view, the new boulevards seemed to be too big, too empty; the Haussmannian buildings, which were all constructed according to quite rigid specifications, seemed uni- form and unimaginative. It is only from the perspective of our own dehumanised 20th century cities that we are tempted CRIARe'ACIE G.}i. to find the Paris created during the Second Empire charming and elegant. The partisans of Haussmannisation would argue, however, that the moderni- sation was necessary simply to allow the city to keep functioning. They posit that Paris was essentially an overgrown medieval city that would soon have suf- focated amidst its own congested groundplan as it tried to meet the increased pressures of modem life. Town planners have estimated that it would have cost as much as 20 times An apartment house typical of the new building during the more to have made the same alterations "Haussmannisation" of Paris in the 1850s (architectural drawing in The Builder XVI, 159, 6 March, 1858) had they been left to the last decades of the 19th century, and that by the first

D more particularly his advisors, became the street with barricades, which effec- easily they could now moye around the influenced by contemporary concerns tively broke the devastating force of a capital. During the Second Empire, sol- about the organic functioning of the city. cavalry charge, then, when the horsemen diers were everywhere, and they were I would like to reflect upon each of were immobilised, proceeded to hurl now looking more magnificent in their these theories in turn, by examining one down a deadly rain of household uniforms than ever before. It was not particular project that would seem to objects, including furniture, from the without grim irony that Karl Marx confirm a particular interpretation. I windows of the houses above. The cav- quipped that Napoleon III had replaced alry retired in confusion, suffering seri- would also like to suggest, however, that Liberty, Fraternity and Equality with ous injury. it is not possible to consider these inter- Infantry, Artillery and Cavalry. pretations in a sort of still-frame, as if It therefore seems logical that The project most closely associated the regime were acting under the same Napoleon III should have insisted upon with Napoleon III's strategic preoccupa- impulses from the start to the finish of creating long, wide boulevards that tions was the completion of the Rue de the Second Empire. As the regime would facilitate cavalry charges, and the Rivoli, which most travellers will recall evolved from a tenuous position in the use of cannon fire to destroy obstruc- as a long street with beautiful arcades early years after the coup d'etat of tions. The greater width of the boule- and luxurious shops bounding the north 1851, to a position of relative stability vard would mean that it would take side of the Louvre Museum. It had been during the 1850s, then to a position of much longer to build barricades: work- begun much earlier in the 19th century, weakness and uncertainty prior to the ers would not have either the time or the by the emperor Napoleon Bonaparte, military disaster of 1870, the concerns materials to build the high, and remark- who wanted to create what he called the and motives of the emperor must have ably solid, barricades that they had con- Great Axis, running east-west, and par- undergone corresponding changes, and structed so effectively in the past. John allel to the River Seine. Napoleon he used his most visible signifier of Merriman points out that as late as 1857 Bonaparte might well have remembered prestige, the Haussmannisation of Paris, the emperor was still sufficiently con- that the nearby Saint Antoine district to different ends. cerned about military considerations to had been a centre of worker radicalism refuse permission for the construction of during the great revolution of 1789-95, decorative arcades because they might but he cannot have been concerned The Strategic Plan affect the strategic plan of the boulevard about barricades, since this particular The most common, and still perva- Mazas. 13 technique was not used during the first sive, explanation of Napoleon III's There is no doubt that Napoleon HI revolution. By the time his nephew, motive for the rebuilding of Paris is that was aware of the strategic importance of Napoleon III, returned to the project, the he wanted to free his regime of the broad thoroughfares, and that he took events of 1830 and 1848 must have threat of urban insurrection that had some measures to secure the rebellious transformed the significance of the great haunted virtually every regime since parts of the city. He was aware that sys- axis. 1789. Anybody who had observed the tems of radiating boulevards, such as the As things stood, the only main axis revolutions of 1830, of February 1848 famous formation at the Arc de of east-west communication was on the and June 1848 would have reflected that Triomphe known as L'Etoile, or the roads that ran along the banks of the a government stood at the mercy of a Star, provided good points at which to River Seine. Once they were blocked - dangerous situation: a radical, militant marshal troops; he placed the main mili- and they could easily be obstructed - it working class familiar with the conduct tary barracks in the dangerous Saint would be almost impossible to move of street fighting and barricade building Antoine district near one such forma- troops into the more congested parts of in the narrow thoroughfares of the old tion, safe in the knowledge that it would the city on the Right Bank. We can gain quarters of Paris. The very fabric of the be almost impossible for the crowd to a good sense of the strategic importance capital made it a liability to the rulers of barricade every one of the access roads. of the new road by contemplating an the nation: the seat of government could He used the broad roads to a second aerial photograph of Paris: the road is just as easily become its prison. We can purpose, as a site for numerous sliced clean through the fabric of the gain a sense of this threat from an grandiose military parades. They were city, as straight as an arrow, a virtual engraving by Delaporte, depicting The frequent, and they were splendid. The conduit from a significant point of Royal Cavalry Driven Back by the parades were no doubt a tribute to the departure to an even more significant People (1830, Bibliotheque Nationale de army, to reward it for its support during destination. In the west, the great mili- France, Paris). The incident took place the coup d'etat, and like all such mani- tary barracks at Courbevoie housed the on the 28th July, 1830: the king's elite festations they were intended to whip up thousands of soldiers who would be at cavalry was detailed to clear out worker popular enthusiasm for the regime. hand to quell an insurrection: they resistance in the radical suburb of Saint More subtly, though, they served as would march first down the Champs- Antoine. The image shows the result, a veiled warnings: they made it explicit, Elysées, then swing into the Rue de defeat that was at once humiliating and under the guise of peaceful rehearsal, Rivoli, then into the Rue Saint Antoine, unthinkable: the local people blocked how many soldiers there were, and how whence they had access to the rebellious wealthy western suburbs of Paris: purely strategic projects, such as the opening up of the rebellious quarter around the Montagne Ste. Genevieve, were in the minority. He argues that the military theory originated at the time of the transformations, amongst the opponents of the regime, who elaborated a form of conspiracy theory, suggesting that the capitalists had hidden their sinister intentions below the aesthetic beauty and amenity of the new city. Nor, he adds, should we place too much faith in the efficacy of these strategic arteries: the savage street fighting during the Paris Commune rebellion of 1870-71 revealed that the Parisian working class- es could still use the city against the authorities. 19 This cautionary note is reiterated by other prominent historians of Paris, such as Donald Olsen. 20 The Reading Room of the National Library, Paris, illustration by Henri Labrouste: the roof "cupolas" are of enamelled porcelain and the room was heated via hot-air pipes at the feet of the readers. It housed 40,000 volumes (from the Illustrated London News, collection of the author). A Monument to the Emperor The second explanation for the eastern suburbs of the city, particularly bluntly called "the suburb of the barri- transformation of Paris was that those areas around the Canal Saint cades". 16 Napoleon III wanted to make the whole Martin and the Place de la Bastille. It Despite these statements of strategic city, rather than just a handful of fine was the last stage of this project - the considerations, historians have chal- buildings, into a monument to his actual cutting of the road into the Saint lenged the military explanation of the regime. As early as 1842, before the end Antoine district - that had been left emperor's motives. If one had to guess of his exile from France, he had record- incomplete, and Napoleon III hastened at Napoleon III's apprehensions about ed his ambition to be a second Emperor to rectify the omission. When the road the Parisian working classes, one would Augustus, the ruler who made Rome was completed, he stated triumphantly: speculate that they were most severe into a splendid monumental city; more The rebels in the suburbs will no before his coup d'etat of December simply, he probably hoped to take up longer have the ability to obstruct 1851, when he fully expected a serious and outdo the early planning initiatives the arrival of reinforcements from urban revolt in defence of the Second of his illustrious uncle, and in doing so outside. The exit of the city to the Republic. Indeed, Louis Napoleon had substitute monumental glory for the mil- west has been opened up. 14 been exerting pressure upon the then itary glory that was largely denied Prefect of the Seine, Berger, to hasten him.21 His personal need for the grand Napoleon III was not alone in voic- the work on the new road as early as conception accorded perfectly with his ing such sentiments: his assistant, 1851, in the months before the coup. 17 assistant's vision of urban renewal. Each Haussmann, seemed - retrospectively at In the event, the Parisian response was project had two parts: the first was the least - to attach similar importance to relatively small and easily controlled; to monumental building itself, and the sec- the project. He wrote in his memoirs, the emperor's surprise, it was the peas- ond was the vista, the line of sight, pro- perhaps under the pressure of justifying ants in a number of provincial depart- viding visual access to it. Haussmann is his own role in the vast project, that he ments who rose in a massive revolt that characterised as having the planner's had freed the government from "the seriously threatened his regime. 18 As mania for the straight line, but in his concern caused to all our kings, even the the 1850s progressed, he also had reason case it was accompanied by a concern most powerful, by the impressionable, to feel that he had won the working for the visual experience of the city. turbulent nature of the Parisian popular classes to his regime by practical if not There was no point, he argued, in erect- classes". 15 He called the new way an ideological means: the very works he ing a new monument, or disengaging an "Artery", and claimed that he had added had initiated generated high levels of existing one, if it was not made the end "a direct, spacious, monumental and employment in the capital. As David point of a vast boulevard sweeping up to above all strategic means of communi- Jordan has pointed out, the majority of it. Conversely, when new boulevards cation" into what one of his assistants new boulevards were built in the were being planned, he consciously ■30 aligned them so that they would begin not so much a place of passage as a worked effectively to convince the capi- or terminate with an important building, place to promenade, to posture and to be talists that it was important to "improve be it a railway station or a church. seen. The vast sweeping stairway and the circulation of merchandise and peo- the numerous balconies and landings are ple throughout the city". 23 We can gain One of the most important disen- a series of small stages where the drama some sense of his determination to gagements of existing monuments of social display and social competition "clear the way" for an efficient economy occurred on the Ile-de-la Cite. Travellers was played out. The other stage, inside, from aerial photographs of Paris show- who stroll in the open space in front of where the performance was held, seems ing key buildings such as the Stock the cathedral of Notre Dame may not be almost incidental by comparison. Exchange building carefully set apart aware that it was the site of what con- with ample space around it, as if to free temporaries called a slum, a close con- The third main motive for the trans- it from the risk not only of barricades centration of tenement buildings that formation of Paris was the creation of a but of all possible encumbrance. were overcrowded and in poor condi- modern city that would have the physi- tion. It must have looked a fearful place: cal infrastructure necessary to the func- contemporaries described the dark tioning of a modern capitalist economy. "Nothing But Iron!" streets and crumbling houses as a sort of As Napoleon III understood this term, it urban jungle, a place of subhuman exis- meant an increase in the scale of exist- The greatest project, though, was the tence and dangerous criminality. 22 ing industrial and commercial activity, construction of the new central market- Haussmann, endowed with extraordi- as well as the introduction of new forms place of Paris, Les Halles. This too was nary executive powers, ordered the of urban activity. There were the new a project whose signification shifted as precinct to be demolished. For the first banks, the great new department stores, the regime progressed: it began its life time in five centuries, the Gothic cathe- and all manner of new entertainments. before the coup of 1851 as a sympathet- dral was disengaged from surrounding In addition, new forms of transport, ic gesture to the working people of dwellings, and stood alone as a monu- such as trains and omnibuses, meant that Paris; by the prosperous 1850s, it had ment. greater numbers of people were travel- become a tribute to the mercantile spirit. ling to Paris from the countryside and Napoleon III had quite accurately Napoleon III' s most famous achieve- were moving around the city. David judged that by 1850 the existing market- ment in the monumental terms was cer- Harvey has argued that Parisian property place had become inadequate for the tainly the construction of the new Paris owners had tended to resist government new Paris, and that it would simply be Opera House; perhaps his most beautiful initiatives for urban renewal during the unable to handle the enormous volume was the creation of the Reading Room preceding period of the July Monarchy of food necessary to provision the grow- of the National Library. The emperor (1830-48). The emperor, by contrast, ing capital. He ordered Berger to act was appropriating the ruler's traditional role of patronising the arts, but he might have had a more personal motive: he had been stung by the way the cultured and well-educated "notables" of France made fun of his lack of traditional edu- cation and his slightly convoluted, hesi- tant way of expressing himself. He was certainly anxious to commemorate his role as a patron of the arts in commis- sioning Charles Gartner, a quite young architect, to create the new Opera House: a large oil painting by Edouard Gilis (n.d, Musee de Compiegne) depicts him visiting the construction site, with the Empress Eugenie and "Baron" George Haussmann, to give their per- sonal encouragement to Gamier. The end result was a building that, for many commentators, characterises the Second Empire: for the purist, it is the epitome of architectural eclecticism and opulent bad taste, while for the social historian it is the very embodiment of the social Painting Paris Street; Rainy Day, by Gustave Caillebotte, 1876-77, oil on canvas (Charles H. and Mary E S. Worchester Collection, The Art Institute of Chicago, U.S.A.) preoccupations of the new high society. The grandiose foyer of the building is quickly to implement a design drawn up emperor was building a sort of military for a new type of building, and there by the architects Baltard and Callet in strong point from which to control the was a scene when the Prefect was virtu- 1847. The emperor was able to lay the suburb.24 At such a sensitive point - ally shouting "Iron! Nothing but iron!" foundation stone of the new markets as only a few months after the army had in to the bewildered architect. Baltard had early as September 1851, thus signalling fact crushed what worker rebellion had had a traditional training, which meant to the workers of Paris that he was able occurred in Paris - the emperor could that he had been taught an essential to translate his theoretical concern for not afford to ignore popular feeling like truth: iron was merely a structural ele- the amelioration of working class life this, and concurred. He ordered that ment, best kept hidden beneath more into physical form. The project was construction be stopped, and consulted "noble" materials such as a stone facade. pushed through with such determination with Haussmann. He revealed that he The idea of constructing a building in that it was almost complete by May had been fascinated by the new industri- which the inner elements were also the 1852. It was then that the emperor's plan al architecture of the great railway sta- outer elements must have seemed as received a serious setback: the intended tions of Paris, and had a vision of vast, outlandish then as the "inside-out" friendly gesture was misinterpreted by light "umbrellas" of metal and glass. design of the Pompidou Centre seemed local people as a threatening one. Haussmann then generously took the in our own time. It was literally the case Baltard's original design was for a very project straight back to Ballard, who had of a pressure point in history, when an solid, fortress-like building with thick been devastated by the shame of having architect had to divest himself of the walls and small windows, and the work- the emperor cancel one of his designs. intellectual baggage of centuries of ing people of the area said that the He tried to explain the emperor's vision inherited tradition, and make the imagi- native leap into an architectural idiom that belongs to the architecture of the 20th century. Ballard prepared two more plans, but still clung to the idea of masonry, if only as stone walls and stone columns. On the third try he got it right: he designed a series of pavillions that were virtually all made of iron. He then had to submit the plan in an archi- tectural contest, in which the emperor would make the final choice. Napoleon III viewed the designs, and rejected one after the other. When he came to Baltard's plans, he burst out excitedly: "Here it is! This is exactly what I have been looking for!"25 Haussmann tact- fully neglected to tell the emperor that the architect was the same one whose earlier design had been rejected. The final plan, agreed between Baltard and Haussmann in 1857, was for two groups of six pavillions separated by three covered streets, and divided by one broad central avenue which today bears the name of its creator. This pro- vided a market area of 21 acres, of which half was sheltered. Baltard equipped Les Halles with its own under- ground reservoir, so that the markets could be guaranteed a supply of water, and with a system of gaslights so that provisioning could take place at night. Later, the stone pavillion, of which Many cutaway and cross-section views of Paris like this one helped people Baltard was so ashamed, was torn down to visualise the new, hygienic city as, like the human body, a supporter of and replaced by one of his iron pavil- life. This contemporary engraving is by Renard. lions. The engineers also devised a plan, some 50 years before the Paris metro was built, to construct an underground line therefore reconciles the needs of to the benefits the speculation brought railway from the Gare de l'Est to Les beauty, the needs of hygiene and the for the bourgeoisie. Caillebotte was in Halles, but this was never realised.26 needs of commerce". 28 This hygienist fact only able to devote himself to paint- discourse is intriguing in itself, and has ing due to this family success. As if to been the subject of a fascinating study The Hygienic City repay the favour, he uses his art to by Alain Corbin, which examines how slightly enhance the family apartment: The fourth interpretation of the western society's sense of smell, and its most modern apartments only had transformation of Paris is that it was understanding of the human body and of wrought iron balconies; the elegant motivated by a concern for public hygiene, has evolved over time. 29 stone balconies were a thing of the past, health. It must be said, however, that the Some of the hygienists' concerns are and were now quite prestigious. concern was not so much Napoleon HI's evident in images that were made of the Caillebotte has painted the young man - it does not seem to figure in any of his new city. Their emphasis on air and in his family apartment standing in front own plans - as that of Haussmann. It light and space, for example, finds an of one of the beautiful old stone bal- should also be noted that he placed a echo in the works of the painter Gustave conies, thus upgrading the quality of priority on the creation of an hygienic Caillebotte, the painter who most their dwelling. Paris from the outset, long before the deserves the title of "an urban gathering swell of criticism forced him Impressionist", and whose superb work to make use of it as a justification. 27 The Hidden City was much neglected until a recent retro- Later, when voices were raised in spective exhibition organised by the Art Turning from what was visible protest at the cost of the project, and at Institute of Chicago. 3° Caillebotte's above ground to what was hidden Haussmann's unorthodox means of Man at a Window (1873, Private below, Haussmann realised that it would financing it, he could draw upon one of Collection), for example, was painted at require quite an effort of propaganda to the most acute of collective fears for precisely the point that Haussmann's make people approve of expensive justification, that of epidemic and dis- project was nearing completion, when infrastructure which they could not see. ease. We can see this mechanism at people felt that they could stand back Indeed, Haussmann invited people to work in contemporary images that he and survey the result. What exactly is think about the city in quite simple had put out, such as cartoons showing this young man admiring with such an terms, as a parallel to the human body the ghastly figure of cholera as a rapa- air of possession? The elegant lady in itself. People had been intrigued when cious monster reproaching him, the wise the boulevard below, her own poise and publishers printed popular medical dia- servant of the public, for depriving it of stylishness both made possible and grammes revealing the secrets of the victims. Such images spoke powerfully reflected in the streetscape around her? human body, and so Haussmann crated to the Parisian public: a cholera epidem- New, broad thoroughfares? The smooth the urban equivalent, cross-sections of ic in 1832 had killed 18,000 people in flow of traffic? Grand vistas? New Paris revealing the hidden infrastructure Paris, while a second outbreak in 1849 apartment buildings? New, prosperous of the capital. Renard's engraving, killed another 19,000; a further outbreak The tenants? Above all, the painting is about Upper and the Lower of Paris is typical of the disease in 1865 added to the light and air. David Pinkney has pointed of this genre. He compared the networks sense of urgency. The human suffering out that Parisians were not used to these of underground Paris with those of our and panicky fear created by such out- qualities. With the exception of the few own bodies: breaks was therefore very fresh in peo- large pre-existing boulevards, especially ple's minds when Haussmann turned his The underground galleries, the those looking out over the River Seine, attention to the aspect of Paris that organs of the great city, will work most streets in Paris had ended to be Napoleon III had almost completely like those of the human body, with- rather dark and narrow, and houses had neglected: the underground of the capi- out being visible. Pure, fresh water, been closely packed around courtyards tal. light and heat will circulate around that tended to be airless. By contrast, the the city like fluids which guarantee When Haussmann explained the new boulevards tended to be dazzlingly principles of hygiene underlying the bright, a quality which Caillebotte has the continuation of life. All the nec- transformation of Paris, he was express- translated in the almost stark light that essary secretions will occur mysteri- ously, and will maintain public ing himself in terms of an already well- surrounds the figure in this painting. established discourse. "Everything that There is a second purchase that this fig- health without disrupting the beauty is in movement," he wrote, "is healthy, ure has upon the spectacle before him, and order of the city. 31 everything that is stagnant is unhealthy: although we can only discover this from People now pored with fascination the free circulation of air and water and the context, rather than the text, of the over cutaway diagrams depicting the the access to light serve to combat the painting: the painter's family had accu- hidden world below the macadam of the effects of crowding in, of the concentra- mulated a comfortable fortune from the street, a replica of the city above, with tion of foul air, of the exhalation of real estate speculation of the Second every gas pipe and water pipe clearly miasmas and of evil odours. The straight Empire, and owned this apartment due marked with a suitable symbol. • The plan to improve the water sup- pressure was to guarantee that it would later in the century. 39 ply of Paris was Haussmann's brain- rise to every level of Parisian apart- There is therefore no doubt that child, and the detailed plans were the ments. His ambitious programme was, Napoleon III and "Baron" Haussmann work of his assistant Eugene however vitiated and slowed by opposi- changed the nature of the urban experi- Belgrand.32 The emperor had apparent- tion from a surprising quarter: there was ence of Parisians fundamentally and ly not considered the problem, and when a public scare campaign which argued definitively. In this paper, I have tried to Haussmann invited him to do so he was that Parisians had been drinking the trace some of the impact of these willing to impatiently pass it on to a pri- water of the River Seine for generations changes upon people's consciousness. I vate company. Haussmann not only and had apparently grown strong on it; must acknowledge that I have left cer- established the concept that important clear water from country springs could tain areas unstudied. I can only note the public facilities should be run by the have all sorts of germs in it. 37 In the interest of other issues, such as government, but that Parisians deserved end, Haussmann managed to double the Haussmann's inventive methods of the best, not the cheapest, water avail- total length of city water mains and to financing the great operation. I have able. He proposed that henceforth, the double the city's water capacity, and he barely mentioned the contribution of water of the River Seine should only be increase the number of houses with other officials, and should note the used for public fountains and for flush- piped water from 6,000 to 34,000. 38 importance of men such as Alphonse ing out the gutters and the sewers of the His grand project certainly trans- Alphand and Eugene Belgrand, who city. Water for drinking and personal formed the private lives of Parisians. would assume another important role as washing was to come from unpolluted When the painter Alfred Stevens execut- the "can-do" men of the Third Republic. springs in the countryside, and brought ed The Bath (Musee d'Orsay, Paris) in I have only referred in passing to the to Paris by a system of aqueducts; the extraordinary creation of Haussmann's water, descending by gravity, would about 1867, he was depicting not an habitual or mundane aspect of everyday mania for uniformity, the new apartment have its own hydraulic pressure, and building wherein the very proportions of would not need to be pumped up labori- life, but a very novel one. It depicts an elegant young Parisienne luxuriating in the facade and the nature of its decora- ously by unreliable machines, as the tion were standardised. I have preferred water of the River Seine was.33 the so-called "new water", which soon came to be termed "city water". For the to speculate upon the more difficult Haussmann presented this idea to a issue of the impulses behind the project. reluctant Napoleon III, who remained first time, bathing could become a regu- lar rather than an occasional occurrence, I would close by suggesting that the distinctly unimpressed until his engi- way forward is not to probe into what neer, remembering the emperor's love of and the bathroom began to change from being the site of rather awkward and the protagonists said, but into what they Roman history, began to talk expansive- did, and the order in which they did it. ly about the aqueducts that fed Rome, makeshift ablutions to being a place of stylishness and comfort. Soap became a The memoirs of the protagonists tend to and were the wonder of the ancient be self-justifying in the face of subse- world.34 luxurious item, and the first shampoos appeared on the market. Some compa- quent opposition and criticism, and self- He got his way. Construction of the nies began to advertise baths as luxuri- aggrandising in relation to each other. Haussmann, for example, attempted to aqueduct began in 1862, a new reservoir ous pieces of furniture. The bathroom give the impression that Napoleon III was begun at Menilmontant in 1863, was now a place to tarry and to relax, had made very little actual progress with and by 1865 the first fresh water from and has taken on some of the intimate the project before 1853, whereas it is springs eighty miles away in the Marne and romantic connotations of the clear that the emperor already had a Valley was flowing through the mains of boudoir: this young woman has been detailed plan and had begun to imple- Paris.35 Henceforth, water from the reading a novel, and now dreamily ment it by the time Haussmann was Seine was called "old water" and was thinks of the lover who has no doubt appointed 40 It is the sequence of actual distributed through one network serving presented her with the flower we see. projects that will prove to be most public facilities. Parisians watched curi- Indeed, Stevens' painting has a note of revealing, and it is their relation to the ously as municipal workers opened up subdued eroticism, and it may be that he relative confidence or apprehension special taps to flush out the gutters, a has depicted another aspect of the new within the imperial regime that will sight recorded by Frank Boggs in his Le fashion, its association with sensuality reveal the shifting ground of the motives Boulevard de la Madeleine, (1893, and sexual enjoyment. It is possible that for the transformation of Paris.+ Metropolitan Museum of Art, New Stevens' model is a young courtesan, York)36 and still practised in Paris one of the stylish and wealthy profes- today. sional prostitutes of the Second Empire. The second type of water was "new These women quickly perceived the water", from the countryside. attraction of receiving their customers Haussmann hoped to distribute it amidst such lavish settings, but amongst through a separate system of mains that the general population this sort of would run down every street of Paris; its bathing did not become popular until • THE FRIENDS OF THE Notes BAILLIEU LIBRARY

1 John Merriman: Aux Marges de la 20 Donald Olsen: The City as a Work of he University of Melbourne Ville. This French edition of Art: London, Paris, Vienna, New Merriman's celebrated work, The Haven and London: Yale University Library greatly appreciates Margins of City Life. Explorations of Press, 1986. p.46. T the support given by the the French Urban Frontier, 1815- 21 David Pinkney: Napoleon III and the Friends of the Baillieu Library, who pro- 1851, New York and Oxford, Oxford Rebuilding of Paris, p.3. vide valuable help in the acquisition of University Press, 1991, has an extra chapter entitled "Les deux villes du 22 Ibid., p.10. special or rare items. baron Haussmann". p.281. 23 John Merriman: Aux Marges de la 2 See: David Pinkney: Napoleon III and Ville, pp.282-283. Benefits of joining Friends the Rebuilding of Paris, Princeton, 24 David Pinkney: Napoleon III and the of the Baillieu Library Princeton University Press, [1958], Rebuilding of Paris, p.77. 1972. pp. 43-44. My paper is heavily • Special events throughout the year. indebted to David Pinkney's pioneer- 25 Ibid., p.78. • Free copies of the Library maga- ing study, which is still authoritative, 26 Ibid., p.79. zines Ex Libris and the and which has been my main guide in Library this argument. 27 Ibid., p.105. Journal. 3 Ibid., pp.30-31. 28 Jean Des Cars and Pierre Pinon: Paris- • 33% discount on Library borrowing Haussmann. "Le Pari d'Haussmann", fee. 4 Ibid., p.7. Paris, Picard, Edition du Pavillon de • Use of the Friends Room at the 5 Herve Maneglier: Paris Imperial. La l'Arsenal, 1991. p.147. Baillieu Library. Vie quotidienne sous le Second 29 Alain Corbin: The Foul and the Empire, Paris, Armand Colin, 1990. Fragrant. Odour and the (French) p.41. You can join the Friends of the Social Imagination, London, Picador, Baillieu Library by completing this Pan Macmillan, 1994. 6 See: Oliver Larkin: Daumier, Man of form. Your support is appreciated. his Time, Boston, Beacon Press, 1966. 30 See the fine exhibition catalogue, p.111. Grand Palais, Paris, 1994-1995: Friends of the Baillieu 7 David Pinkney: Napoleon III and the Gustave Caillebotte, Paris, Editions Rebuilding of Paris, pp.8-9. des Musees Nationaux, 1994. Library Membership Form 8 Ibid., p.41. 31 Herve Maneglier: Paris Imperial, I wish to become a Friend of the pp.101-102. Baillieu Library 9 Ibid., pp. 41-42. 32 David Pinkney: Napoleon III and the 10 Ibid., p.42. Name Rebuilding of Paris, p.128. 11 Ibid., p.42. 33 Ibid., p.114. Address 12 Ibid., p.41. 34 Ibid., p.134. 13 John Merriman: Aux Marges de la 35 Ibid., p.121. Ville, p.285. Postcode 36 Barbara Stern Shapiro: Pleasures of 14 David Pinkney: Napoleon III and the Paris: Daumier to Picasso, Boston, Rebuilding of Paris, p.53. Museum of Fine Arts, 1991. p. 64. Telephone: 15 John Merriman: Aux Marges de la Exhibition catalogue no 6. Ville, p.284. 37 David Pinkney: Napoleon III and the Membership (please tick) 16 Ibid., 284. Rebuilding of Paris, p.114. 17 David Pinkney: Napoleon III and the 38 Ibid., p.126. Single $35 Rebuilding of Paris, p.49. 39 Herve Maneglier: Paris lmperiale, 18 See Ted Margadant: French Peasants p.119. Double $50 in Revolt. The Insurrection of 1851, 40 David Pinkney: Napoleon III and the New Jerse, Princeton University Rebuilding of Paris, p.53. Institution $100 Press, 1979. 19 David Jordan: "Haussmann's Donation $ Boulevards", a paper written for the (Donations are tax deductible) Tenth George Rude Conference, Melbourne, 1996. The paper is await- ing publication. pp. 2-3. Send the completed form and your pay- ment to: The Executive Secretary Friends of the Baillieu Library The Baillieu Library The University of Melbourne Parkville 3052 •