If you are having any difficulty using this website, please contact the Help Desk at Help@nullHofstra.edu or 516-463-7777 or Student Access Services at SAS@nullhofstra.edu or 516-463-7075. Please identify the webpage address or URL and the specific problems you have encountered and we will address the issue.

Skip to Main Content
Hofstra University Museum
  • Uncharted: American Abstraction in the Information Age | January 28-June 19, 2020 | Emily Lowe Gallery, behind Emily Lowe Hall, South Campus
  • David Filderman Gallery | Other People’s Parties | August 13, 2019-March 13, 2020 | Joan and Donald Axinn Library Ninth Floor, South Campus

A Tale of Two Cities:
Eugene Atget's Paris & Berenice Abbott's New York

September 6 - October 23, 2005
Emily Lowe Gallery, Lowe Hall


More than an exhibition of architectural photography, this show examines the work of two artists who were inextricably linked to each other and to the development of modern photography. Eugene Atget turned to photography later in his life after previous careers. He was dismayed by the the amount of architectural history being destroyed during the modernization of Paris and began photographing the city's shop fronts, streets and neighborhoods. Berenice Abbott met Atget in 1925 when she was working as a darkroom assistant to Man Ray. Abbott was permanently affected by Atget's images. Upon returning to New York City after an eight year absence, Abbott realized that the city had changed tremendously. She embarked on a project to document the ever-changing cityscape. Her efforts produced a catalog of images that, like Atget's earlier photographs of Paris, record the essential character of the city.

This exhibition is on loan from the Syracuse University Art Collection, Traveling Exhibition Program.

  • Eugene Atget - Avenue des Gobelins, 1921-26
  • Eugene Atget - Street Vendor, c. 1915
  • Berenice Abbott - Sumner Healy Antique Shop, 1936
  • Berenice Abbott - St. Mark's with Skywriting, 1937

  • Uncharted: American Abstraction in the Information Age | January 28-June 19, 2020 | Emily Lowe Gallery, behind Emily Lowe Hall, South Campus
  • David Filderman Gallery | Other People’s Parties | August 13, 2019-March 13, 2020 | Joan and Donald Axinn Library Ninth Floor, South Campus