The Most Famous

PHOTOGRAPHERS from France

This page contains a list of the greatest French Photographers. The pantheon dataset contains 148 Photographers, 16 of which were born in France. This makes France the birth place of the 3rd most number of Photographers behind United States, and Germany.

Top 10

The following people are considered by Pantheon to be the top 10 most legendary French Photographers of all time. This list of famous French Photographers is sorted by HPI (Historical Popularity Index), a metric that aggregates information on a biography’s online popularity. Visit the rankings page to view the entire list of French Photographers.

1. Nadar (1820 - 1910)

With an HPI of 70.27, Nadar is the most famous French Photographer. His biography has been translated into 60 different languages on wikipedia.

Gaspard-Félix Tournachon (5 April 1820 – 20 March 1910), known by the pseudonym Nadar or Félix Nadar, was a French photographer, caricaturist, journalist, novelist, balloonist, and proponent of heavier-than-air flight. In 1858, he became the first person to take aerial photographs. Photographic portraits by Nadar are held by many of the great national collections of photographs. His son, Paul Nadar, continued the studio after his death.

2. Henri Cartier-Bresson (1908 - 2004)

With an HPI of 69.54, Henri Cartier-Bresson is the 2nd most famous French Photographer. His biography has been translated into 55 different languages.

Henri Cartier-Bresson (French: [ɑ̃ʁi kaʁtje bʁɛsɔ̃]; 22 August 1908 – 3 August 2004) was a French artist and humanist photographer considered a master of candid photography, and an early user of 35mm film. He pioneered the genre of street photography, and viewed photography as capturing a decisive moment. Cartier-Bresson was one of the founding members of Magnum Photos in 1947. In the 1970s, he largely discontinued his photographic work, instead opting to paint.

3. Robert Doisneau (1912 - 1994)

With an HPI of 65.08, Robert Doisneau is the 3rd most famous French Photographer. His biography has been translated into 47 different languages.

Robert Doisneau (French pronunciation: [ʁɔbɛʁ dwano]; 14 April 1912 – 1 April 1994) was a French photographer. From the 1930s, he photographed the streets of Paris. He was a champion of humanist photography and, with Henri Cartier-Bresson, a pioneer of photojournalism. Doisneau is known for his 1950 image Le baiser de l'hôtel de ville (The Kiss by the City Hall), a photograph of a couple kissing on a busy Parisian street. He was appointed a Chevalier (Knight) of the Legion of Honour in 1984 by then French president, François Mitterrand.

4. Dora Maar (1907 - 1997)

With an HPI of 64.12, Dora Maar is the 4th most famous French Photographer. Her biography has been translated into 34 different languages.

Henriette Theodora Markovitch (22 November 1907 – 16 July 1997), known as Dora Maar, was a French photographer, painter, and poet. Maar was both a pioneering Surrealist artist and an antifascist activist. Her revolutionary work ranged from commercial assignments in fashion and advertising to documenting social and economic struggles during the Depression, and explored evocative Surrealist themes. Maar was one of the few photographers to be included in important exhibitions of surrealist work in the 1930s in Paris, New York and London, alongside Man Ray and Salvador Dalí. Her daring techniques in the darkroom explore psychology, dreams and inner states. Maar's political activism and photographic style is widely acknowledged to have influenced Pablo Picasso's work during the period of their romantic relationship. In particular, Maar's influence can be seen in Picasso's powerful anti-war painting Guernica (1937). "She influenced Picasso to paint Guernica – he had never entered political painting before," says Amar Singh, curator of Amar Gallery in London. Maar was depicted in a number of Picasso's paintings, including his Portrait of Dora Maar and Dora Maar au Chat. However, Maar said of the works: "All his portraits of me are lies. They're all Picassos. Not one is Dora Maar."

5. Elliott Erwitt (1928 - 2023)

With an HPI of 62.12, Elliott Erwitt is the 5th most famous French Photographer. His biography has been translated into 23 different languages.

Elliott Erwitt (born Elio Romano Erwitz, July 26, 1928 – November 29, 2023) was a French-born American advertising and documentary photographer known for his black and white candid photos of ironic and absurd situations within everyday settings. He was a member of Magnum Photos from 1953.

6. Claude Cahun (1894 - 1954)

With an HPI of 56.11, Claude Cahun is the 6th most famous French Photographer. Her biography has been translated into 26 different languages.

Claude Cahun (French pronunciation: [klod ka.œ̃], born Lucy Renee Mathilde Schwob; 25 October 1894 – 8 December 1954) was a French surrealist photographer, sculptor, and writer. Schwob adopted the pseudonym Claude Cahun in 1914. Cahun is best known as a writer and self-portraitist, who assumed a variety of performative personae. In her writing, she consistently referred to herself as elle (she), and this article follows her practice; but she also said that her actual gender was fluid. For example, in Disavowals, Cahun writes: "Masculine? Feminine? It depends on the situation. Neuter is the only gender that always suits me." Cahun is most well known for her androgynous appearance, which challenged the strict gender roles of her time. During World War II, Cahun was also active as a resistance worker and propagandist, founding the leftist group Contre Attaque, a union of communist writers, artists and workers, alongside André Breton and Marcel Moore.

7. Jacques Henri Lartigue (1894 - 1986)

With an HPI of 55.65, Jacques Henri Lartigue is the 7th most famous French Photographer. His biography has been translated into 23 different languages.

Jacques Henri Lartigue (French: [laʁtig]; 13 June 1894 – 12 September 1986) was a French photographer and painter, known for his photographs of automobile races, planes and female Parisian fashion models.

8. Hippolyte Bayard (1801 - 1887)

With an HPI of 54.34, Hippolyte Bayard is the 8th most famous French Photographer. His biography has been translated into 17 different languages.

Hippolyte Bayard (French pronunciation: [ipɔlit bajaʁ]; 20 January 1801 – 14 May 1887) was a French photographer and pioneer in the history of photography. He invented his own process that produced direct positive paper prints in the camera and presented the world's first public exhibition of photographs on 24 June 1839. He claimed to have invented photography earlier than Louis-Jacques Mandé Daguerre in France and William Henry Fox Talbot in England, the men traditionally credited with its invention. Bayard experimented with the new medium taking photos of plant specimens, statuary (including posing with them for self-portraits), street scenes, urban landscapes, architectural photos, and portraits. He photographed prominent figures and an ordinary worker. He also advocated combination printing and was one of the founders of a photo society.

9. André-Adolphe-Eugène Disdéri (1819 - 1889)

With an HPI of 54.33, André-Adolphe-Eugène Disdéri is the 9th most famous French Photographer. His biography has been translated into 16 different languages.

André Adolphe-Eugène Disdéri (French: [ɑ̃dʁe adɔlf(ə) øʒɛn(ə) dizdeʁi]; 28 March 1819 – 4 October 1889) was a French photographer who started his photographic career as a daguerreotypist but gained greater fame for patenting his version of the carte de visite, a small photographic image which was mounted on a card. Disdéri, a brilliant showman, made this system of mass-production portraiture world famous.

10. Patrick Demarchelier (1943 - 2022)

With an HPI of 54.17, Patrick Demarchelier is the 10th most famous French Photographer. His biography has been translated into 18 different languages.

Patrick Demarchelier (French pronunciation: [patʁik dəmaʁʃəlje]; 21 August 1943 – 31 March 2022) was a French fashion photographer. In 2018, Demarchelier was accused of sexual harassment by seven models.

People

Pantheon has 19 people classified as French photographers born between 1801 and 1968. Of these 19, 2 (10.53%) of them are still alive today. The most famous living French photographers include Sophie Calle, and Hedi Slimane. The most famous deceased French photographers include Nadar, Henri Cartier-Bresson, and Robert Doisneau. As of April 2024, 3 new French photographers have been added to Pantheon including Patrick Demarchelier, Guy Bourdin, and Françoise Demulder.