ALPHONSE DAVID

Who is Alphonse David? He was a Breton who was born in Vannes in 1860 while Napoleon III was in power. Alphonse David wasn’t aware of this at the time, but nine years after his birth, a concept was invented in Austria that would change the course of his entire life: the postcard. In 1886, aged 26, David acquired La Librairie Catholique bookshop in rue Emile Burgault in Vannes, succeeding Mr Caudéran. David went on to publish books on Brittany, and a few years later met Mr Cardinal, a well-known photographer and postcard publisher. This encounter changed his life and, between 1889 and 1903, he photographed his home region so that visitors to the area could take home a souvenir postcard.

More than a century later, his legacy contains 750 flexible cellulose nitrate negatives, a medium that appeared at the end of the 19th century to replace glass plates but which is now known to be chemically unstable, fragile and difficult to preserve. Fortunately, all the negatives were entrusted to the curator of the Morbihan Departmental Archives following the death of Alphonse David’s widow and the closure of his publishing house in 1928.

 These images, even with their timeless black and white, seem lost in the midst of time. The local council’s archive department has scanned the collection, which shows a Brittany that often struggled with the realities of the modern world. The clothes, architecture and everyday objects have all changed, swept away by the inexorable passage of time.

As a postcard editor, Alphonse David travelled all over the Morbihan region, capturing the fishermen of Lorient for posterity, along with the Bigouden headdresses, the washerwomen in La Marle, the religious celebrations, farm workers in the fields, conscripts in their barracks, monuments and groups of people. This collection resurrects fragments of early 20th century Brittany, when photography was still in its infancy. A wander through Morbihan as it was 100 years ago; a photographic journey through time.

Supported by the Morbihan Departmental Archives.