Arc de Triomphe

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About Arc de Triomphe

The construction of the 216-year-old monument started in 1806 when Napoleon I orders to build it to honor the victories of his huge army. The construction took about 30 years to finish (1836) when King Lodewijk Filips was sitting on the throne. All battles and generals from the Revolution and the First Empire are inscribed in this colossal monument. Now, we honor those who have fought and died for France. Later, under the Arc de Triomphe, lies the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier, from the First World War. Its flame is lit every night to honor and respect those who have fallen during the First World War. During this war, Charles Godefroy flew his plane under the arch's primary vault.

Jean-François Chalgrin is the architect who designed the Arc de Triomphe, he used Lutetian Limestone to build the Arc de Triomphe. It is 50 meters (164ft) high, 45 meters (148ft) wide, and has a depth of 22 meters (72ft), which makes this monument quite big. The location of the monument is on the right bank of the Seine. The foundations alone took about 2 years to construct, while the entire monument took 30 years to finish. The arches are decorated with allegorical figures from Roman mythology, the ceiling of the arch is decorated with 21 sculpted roses, and there are more than 13,300 names of fallen soldiers engraved on the Arc de Triomphe. The monument also serves as a memorial to 70,000 soldiers who died in the First World War.

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Summary

After we had our breakfast at Bo & Mie, we made our way to the first thing I wanted to show Dymph, Arc de Triomphe. Most photographs fail to capture the scale of this magnificent and massive landmark. It is really big, but due to its symmetry, it may look smaller in the pictures than it is. We loved looking at the big thing. I tried to see if I could re-create my first photograph of Arc de Triomphe, 9 years ago. I've added a teaser in my blog post about where I should begin writing/editing.

The weather was nice, we were so lucky. Last time, it was rainy and gray, right now, it is sunny and cloudy, just perfect. Dymph thought it was an incredible piece of work, she didn't expect it to be this big. While we were running a little bit behind in our planning, we took some time to view Arc de Triomphe from a few perspectives. Even though we didn't go up close, it was nice to finally see it once again. It was a little bit too crowded for Dymph to get her ass over there. And I've seen it before, but I did decide to take some photographs of the impressive details of this building. It's just insane, like most architecture in Paris. I should've studied architecture instead, I would try to re-create stuff like this, but a bit modernized.

It's a shame we don't see these types of details anymore in our modern lives. It truly is. All too often missed opportunities are in plain sight. Right? I wonder how life would've been around here during the times when these colossal landmarks were built. Incredible.

Enjoy the pictures!

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Historical Sculptures

There are 6 sculpted reliefs on every side of the Arc de Triomphe, each of them telling and sharing important stories about the French Revolution and the Napoleonic era. Then there are four huge sculptures on each of the Arc's pillars. The most famous of them, The Departure of the Volunteers, also known as La Marseillaise (which I did not photograph this trip), was created by sculptor François Rude. The others were crafted by two other sculptors, Antoine Etex (which I both photographed down below) and Jean-Pierre Cortot.

Le passage du pont d'Arcole, 15 November 1796

On the top right, you see a sculpture that represents the"Battle of Arcole" between the French and Austrian.

La prise d'Alexandrie, 3 July 1798

Here is a close-up of the "Battle of the Pyramids" sculpture, also known as the "Battle of Embabeh" during the invasion of Egypt when the French attacked the city Embabeh across the Nile river from Cairo.

La Résistance de 1814

Sculptured by Antoine Etex

La Paix de 1815

Sculptured by Antoine Etex





To give you an idea of the size of these huge sculptures, I've added a few photographs where you can see how tiny people are compared to the sculpture. Keep in mind that Arc de Triomphe is 50 meters high(!), that's over 160 feet.

Recreating the first photograph I took of Arc de Triomphe

As I mentioned earlier, I wanted to see if I could recreate the same photograph that I took in Paris, 9 years ago. Now, with a lot less lens dirt (it was a catastrophe last time), better weather, and a much more robust camera. I took a few hours of my time to fully edit the photograph below. I tried to make the image much calmer by removing some people, cars, and trash. I think this would look good on a wall. What do you think?

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Ever been to Paris?

Have you ever been to Paris? What's your favorite landmark to visit? And if you haven't, did you know that the Arc de Triomphe is so big?! And of course... a huge shoutout to @hiddenblade for making this trip possible with her artwork being exhibited during the Focus Art Fair at Carrousel du Louvre! I wish I took the time to photograph all four main sculptures, they are super impressive, I thought I had them photographed 9 years ago, but of course, the quality isn't that great nor does it do the sculptures any justice.

I hope you enjoyed these photographs of Arc de Triomphe,

Cheers,
Ruben

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