Roller skating in Paris – Eugène Gaujean, 1877
€350
ROLLER SKATING DURING THE BELLE ÉPOQUE IN PARIS
“Au Skating-Ring”, etching by Eugène Gaujean, published in Paris by Veuve A. Cadart in 1877 as part of “L’Illustration nouvelle”. Signed “E. Gaujean” in the plate lower left. Size: 26 × 14.5 cm.
A fashionably dressed young woman ventures onto roller skates in an elegantly illuminated Parisian skating rink. Cautiously holding on to the balustrade with one hand, she looks down as she concentrates on keeping her balance. Her somewhat uncertain pose contrasts amusingly with her elegant appearance.
In 1875–1876, the French capital was swept by a veritable ‘rinkomanie‘ or ‘skatinomanie‘. The development of more easily manoeuvrable four-wheeled roller skates made it possible to turn and perform movements broadly similar to those of ice skating. After a large skating rink opened at the Cirque des Champs-Élysées in November 1875, numerous other rinks followed within little more than a year.
The most fashionable rinks became part of modern Parisian entertainment and were equipped with promenades, buffets, restaurants, orchestras and modern electric lighting. Visitors came not merely to skate, but also to stroll, socialise and, above all, to see and be seen. Roller skating thus became part of the same fashionable leisure culture as the boulevards, café-concerts, balls and other popular places of entertainment.
For women, the skating rink also offered a new form of freedom of movement in public. This still had to be negotiated within the strict conventions of 1870s fashion: long skirts, close-fitting bodices and elaborate headwear. The combination of elegant women’s dress and the precarious business of manoeuvring on small wheels became a favourite subject for illustrators and caricaturists.
Eugène Gaujean (1850–1900) was a French draughtsman, etcher and engraver who exhibited at the Paris Salon from 1877 onwards. With Au Skating-Ring, Gaujean chose a distinctly contemporary subject: not a historical or literary scene, but an episode from modern Parisian life, captured almost immediately after the height of Europe’s first great roller-skating craze.
Price: Euro 350,-
