Sarah Bernhardt in "Zaire" by Voltaire (1874): Art, History and Details

Sarah Bernhardt in "Zaire" by Voltaire (1874) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection. The museum's creator attribution is Étienne Carjat (French, 1828–1906).

The work and its context

The museum's open-access catalogue describes the work:

Famed French actress Sarah Bernhardt is seen here as the star of Zaire, a play by the French author Voltaire first performed in 1732. The actress, who studied sculpture, exhibited work in the Paris Salon for the first time in 1874. She just missed being in the same show as Morisot, who exhibited regularly at the Salon from 1864 to 1873, but in 1874 decided instead to show in the first Impressionist exhibition. Édouard Manet produced many portraits of actresses and performers.

Object facts

• Title: Sarah Bernhardt in "Zaire" by Voltaire
• Date: 1874
• Creator attribution: Étienne Carjat (French, 1828–1906)
• Culture: France, 19th century
• Type: Photograph
• Technique: albumen print from wet collodion negative
• Dimensions: Image: 27.3 x 21.3 cm (10 3/4 x 8 3/8 in.); Matted: 50.8 x 40.6 cm (20 x 16 in.)
• Collection: Photography
• Department: Photography
• Accession number: 1996.245

A detail from the museum

Photographer Étienne Carjat established his reputation through celebrity portraiture.

Collection credit

John L. Severance Fund

Further reading listed by the museum

• Cleveland Museum of Art, Tom E Hinson. Catalogue of Photography. Cleveland, OH: Cleveland Museum of Art, 1996.

View the collection record

See the museum's photographs and full catalogue entry. Catalogue text is reproduced from the Cleveland Museum of Art's open-access data, with HTML formatting removed. This object and its supplied image are designated CC0.