Nadar

Nadar (nädär') [key], pseud. of Gaspard-Félix Tournachon (gäspär'-fālēks' tOOrnäshôN') [key], 1820–1910, French pioneer photographer and writer, b. Paris. Nadar opened a photographic studio in 1853 that became a meeting place for literary and artistic celebrities whose faces were captured in his superb portraits. He conceived the idea of mapmaking and surveying from a balloon, completing his first aerial photographs c.1858. Nadar invented the photo-essay, but his prose essays and novels brought him greater fame in his day than his photographs. His work is preserved in the Bibliothèque nationale.

The Columbia Electronic Encyclopedia, 6th ed. Copyright © 2007, Columbia University Press. All rights reserved.

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