Pifferari, 21, Quai de Bourbon, 1854 (Italian Musicians, 21, Quai de Bourbon)

Charles Nègre began his career as a painter, working in the studio of Paul Delaroche, who encouraged his pupils to embrace photography as a means of developing their compositions. Nègre took some forty photographs of Paris in an effort to document the transformations the city was undergoing at the time. In 1853, he photographed the Stryge, the same gargoyle situated on the parapet of Notre Dame Cathedral that was captured by Charles Meryon in his etching the same year. This photograph featuring two Italian street musicians, or pifferari, was taken outside Nègre’s studio on the Île Saint-Louis in the heart of Old Paris.