EXPOSITION PHOTO " LE PARIS DES ANNÉES 30"

Boris Lipniski Photographs

Born in Ukraine, in Oster, near Odessa, in 1887, Boris Lipnitzki moved to Paris in 1921. He opened a photography studio and quickly became friends with fashion designer Paul Poiret, who introduced him to his clientele. Starting in 1924, he published in *Femina* and *Excelsior* fashion spreads featuring designs by Heim, Schiaparelli, Chanel, and Rouff, as well as portraits of celebrities (Josephine Baker, Dulin, Artaud, Cocteau, Jouvet, Giraudoux, Anouilh, Michel Simon, and Colette) as well as society features. Boris Lipnitzki frequented the Russian community in Paris, visited artists’ studios, and photographed ballet and theater productions, as well as authors and performers (Fokine, Stanvinsky, Prokofiev, Lifar). Of Russian-Jewish origin, he was troubled by Nazi persecution. He turned to his friends for help. Louis Jouvet stored his glass plates and negatives in the cellars of the Théâtre de l’Athénée. Fleeing occupied France, he was taken in by Marc Chagall in New York. After the war, he reopened Studio Lipnitzki, which, until the late 1960s, covered Parisian theater, ballet, and opera. Boris Lipnitzki died in Paris in 1971. A large portion of his photographic work, as well as that of Studio Lipnitzki—more than one million negatives and 600,000 prints—was acquired by the Roger-Viollet Agency in 1970. In 1994, for its 20th anniversary, the Galerie Municipale du Château d’Eau, founded by Jean Dieuzaide, paid tribute to Lipnitzki despite the poor condition of the remaining negatives and the glass plates, which were impossible to transport. Today, in partnership with LieuZaide, the Tourist Office is able to present a selection of the prints exhibited in 1994.

Opening reception: Thursday, July 23, at 5:30 p.m.