Storyville Portrait

A lifelong resident of New Orleans, Ernest J. Bellocq was a commercial photographer who undertook a personal quest to photograph the prostitutes of Storyville, the city's red-light district. In these frank and intimate photographs, women are not portrayed as prey to the camera's gaze, but rather seem to participate willingly and confidently in the photographic act. Rumored to be eccentric and reserved, Bellocq told only a handful of acquaintances about these portraits, which primarily date from 1912 (the negatives were later discovered and printed by photographer Lee Friedlander). This photograph of Bellocq's desk, therefore, provides an unusual glimpse into his mysterious personality and life. The cluttered arrangement of images of women, juxtaposed with floral wallpaper and languidly posing marble figurines, coheres into a dotingly composed shrine to femininity, hinting at the artist's admiration for women.