Edmond Bacot Artwork valuations, appraisals and auction estimates

Edmond Bacot (1814-1875) was a French photographer. He is one of the pioneers of photography in Caen. He is famous for photographing Victor Hugo in exile in Guernsey.
Grandson of Alexandre Bacot, he was born in Caen to a family of Protestant merchants. Read the full biography

Edmond Bacot (1814-1875) was a French photographer. He is one of the pioneers of photography in Caen. He is famous for photographing Victor Hugo in exile in Guernsey.
Grandson of Alexandre Bacot, he was born in Caen to a family of Protestant merchants. He trained first as a painter, then attended the School of Fine Arts in Paris. He returned to Caen in 1850, where he took his first photographs. In December 1852, as a fervent republican, Bacot visited the great writer Victor Hugo shortly after his exile on the island of Jersey in 1852, bringing goods and funds to the exile community. Hugo greatly admired the photographs that Bacot brought and subsequently sent to him throughout the year, calling them "wonders". In 1853, Hugo's son Charles studied photography with Bacot. With other photographer friends, he participated in the creation of the Société des beaux-arts de Caen in 1855 and in the Caen art exhibition where a quarantine of photographs were presented. In their dramatic use of shadow and light, mass and detail, Bacot's images exemplify a new, romanticized vision of the Gothic, articulated most vividly in the writings and drawings of Victor Hugo. Bacot died in Caen on 26 April 1875. A university residence bears his name on the campus of the University of Caen.