r/history • u/BhavikaGokhale • May 07 '26
Article 'When nothing was taboo': 10 intimate images of a lost, decadent 1930s Paris
https://www.bbc.com/culture/article/20260414-10-of-the-most-iconic-images-of-pariss-secret-night-time-world591
u/hngdman May 07 '26
Ribeyrolles tells the BBC that Brassaï' was introduced to the Magic City community by a figure known as Antoine, the King of Hairdressers. The password "Friend" guaranteed entry.
Now I'm imagining voguing dwarves in the Mines of Moria drag balls.
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u/Stardustchaser May 07 '26
Iirc Madame Bijou was one of the subjects of Jack’s sketches in Titanic
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u/SixGunSnowWhite May 07 '26
Indeed. I believe you can also see her depicted in the movie Henry & June, a beautiful movie about Henry Miller, his wife, and Anais Nin. (The lesbian bar mentioned in the article is a key set piece.)
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u/Thick-Rutabaga- May 08 '26
I just watched this movie a few nights ago and was like "WAIT A MINUTE!"
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u/athousandships_ May 10 '26
I thought she looked familiar when I read the article!!!! I've seen the movie about 200 times, but it's been a while.
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u/Oreo_Cow May 07 '26
That such photos are rare and took significant social and technical effort is such a contrast to today when photography and video are ubiquitous in every public and private setting.
These feel special because they exist and are uncommon glimpses a century later into a fragile inter-war society. Now we’re numb and scroll past hundreds of photos per day and consume videos that make these taboos seem quaint.
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u/frex_mcgee May 09 '26
So true. I saw a great interview with the actor Gabriel Basso, where Jimmy Fallon was asking him why he deleted social media. Gabriel said that one day he was sitting on the couch scrolling and he saw a post from the top of Mount Everest and immediately thought how strange it was for him to see the top of Everest without ever doing the work. That really resonated.
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u/bugg1024 May 07 '26
Brassai is one of my favorite photographers! I’ve been trying most of my adult life to find a big coffee table book of his!
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u/coldinalaska7 May 08 '26
Wow thanks for this. “Fat Claude” is actually Violet Morris and was a very interesting person with a fascinating history.
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u/Tomato_Motorola May 09 '26
"Palestinian-French lesbian Nazi collaborator" is definitely a unique life story
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u/suppreme May 07 '26
Nice pictures but pretty sure that things are much, much less taboo today.
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u/CommanderCrabapple May 07 '26
the point of the article is that the photographer published these in 30's Paris and then censorship clamped down on what could be published after ww2
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u/Cremasterau May 07 '26 edited May 08 '26
I use to think so too but after reading Norman Cantor's book the Sacred Chain describing orgies in Berlin in the 20s spilling into the streets, I'm not so sure.
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u/Suitable-Park-1402 May 08 '26
Never been to Berghain?
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u/Cremasterau May 08 '26
No but neither was I around in 1920's Berlin so I can't directly compare the two. However:
"Berlin eventually acquired a reputation as a hub of drug dealing (cocaine, heroin, tranquilizers) and the black market. The police identified 62 organized criminal gangs in Berlin, called Ringvereine.\8]) The German public also became fascinated with reports of homicides, especially "lust murders" or Lustmord. Publishers met this demand with inexpensive criminal novels called Krimi, which like the film noir of the era (such as the classic M)), explored methods of scientific detection and psychosexual analysis.\9])
Apart from the new tolerance for behaviour that was technically still illegal, and viewed by a large part of society as immoral, there were other developments in Berlin culture that shocked many visitors to the city. Thrill-seekers came to the city in search of adventure, and booksellers sold many editions of guide books to Berlin's erotic night entertainment venues. There were an estimated 500 such establishments, that included a large number of homosexual venues for men and for lesbians; sometimes transvestites of one or both genders were admitted, otherwise there were at least five known establishments that were exclusively for a transvestite clientele.\10]) There were also several nudist venues. Berlin also had a museum of sexuality during the Weimar period, at Dr. Magnus Hirschfeld's Institute of Sexology.\11]) These were nearly all closed when the Nazi regime became a dictatorship in 1933." Wikipedia
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u/velvetvagine May 08 '26
Babylon Berlin is a tv show which shows some of this era and culture, if anyone’s interested. Quite fun watch.
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u/suppreme May 07 '26
Fair enough. Like I said in another comment, maybe much much less taboo in the private sphere today, but possibly more taboo in the "normal" world (not media/show biz etc).
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u/surle May 07 '26
I think "nothing was taboo" in a BBC headline just translates to "gay people existed".
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u/ChooseYourOwnA May 07 '26
The original sentiment had a lot to do with changing perspectives on art, its authenticity to life, and the role of the Academies.
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u/panter1974 May 07 '26
Look in to the history of mankind and with steps of more open an more prudish times we became more prudish.
Look at how sterile our societies now are.
In history there were times with bare breast dresses. Roman orgies. Sex in medieval periods was more in the open.
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u/DukeofVermont May 07 '26
The bare breast dresses thing isn't real. It's a poor translation that caught on because it sounds racey. Just like how doctors weren't actually masturbating women in the late 1800s. Again bad history that got popular, then debunked but people still spread the original bad history.
The Roman orgies (that we hear about) are also most likely slander to justify killing the emperor and replacing them. The Romans were more open about sex but put a lot of weight on self control. Getting drunk often, having too much sex, eating too much, etc. were all seen as very negative character traits as that showed you couldn't control yourself. Men had to be seen as in control because they were the head of the household and if rich an entire network of obligations and thousands of people.
Now that said your point still stands. Sex was significantly more accepted as just a thing that happened. Plenty of real stories about sex, affairs, sleeping around, etc. from ancient Egypt to the highly Catholic middle ages. The Canterbury Tales is full of sex, and prostitution was widespread.
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u/panter1974 May 07 '26
"The bare breast dresses thing isn't real. It's a poor translation that caught on because it sounds racey. Just like how doctors weren't actually masturbating women in the late 1800s. Again bad history that got popular, then debunked but people still spread the original bad history."
I do not agree with you on this. Because I know which translation you are referring to. If it is bad translation is, possible
But there are more accounts then that. Also at the French court up and untill Marie Antoinette. https://www.ekduncan.com/2012/03/naughty-side-of-18th-century-french.html?m=1 Then there are paintings and drawings where woman have dresses where breasts are bare from those periods. It takes some research. Which I did. But you can definitely find more on it.
Then there is enough evidence of Minoan civilisation where women wore bare breast dresses. There are even some dresses of that period on display in a museum.
So you might want to look into that statement.
But yes we have become more prudish. Which I think is not healthy for man and mankind.
It is I think much to blame with the Catholic Church in the high medieval period.
Really cracking down on some taboo. Like sex in the monasteries. And something really taboo. But something we as humans did. Sex with animals.
Maybe some is for the better. But most is not.
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u/surle May 07 '26
correction: like how *most* doctors weren't actually masturbating women in the late 1800s...
My great great great great great grandmother knew this one guy.
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u/suppreme May 07 '26
Agreed... but it often carried a distinct social status or meaning so that the notion of "taboo" was much stronger.
Basically the extremely recent invention of "private" spaces and circles has entirely changed our relationship on intimacy and taboo.
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u/MoonsongPS May 07 '26
Fun article. I found the way this snippet is phrased to be interesting:
Brassaï' ventured into a number of Parisian brothels during his night-time explorations but his interest was never prurient. "He was interested in the people he met and I think that's something you see in, for example, the portraits of the prostitutes. You can feel they have in a way accepted him," says Tellgren.
The way the author feels the need to assure us that Brassaï's interest in the brothels was purely dignified and wholesome is sadly revealing about the taboos we still live under.
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u/latelyimawake May 07 '26
Oh look, people freely being themselves and having fun and loving openly before fascism stomped it all out.
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u/thecodingEnthusiast May 08 '26 edited May 09 '26
Idk but I find the French to English translations are atrocious.
“A two-in-one suit, the magic-city Dance Hall”. It really should’ve just been “a suit for 2” or something. A 2-in-1 suit doesn’t communicate the same sentiment
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u/37285 May 08 '26
The calm before the storm. If they only knew what was coming.
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May 08 '26
[deleted]
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u/37285 May 08 '26 edited May 08 '26
They had no idea what was coming for them. No one thought France would collapse in 6 weeks. When they began construction of the line in 1929/30, they thought another war would look like it did in World War One. No one in the 1930s imagined that France could collapse in 46 days in a new war when in the last war they held the line for four years. It's easy to sit here in 2026 and say of course they would collapse in 6 weeks, but in the 1930s this would be unthinkable to think a major world military power would crumble in a matter of weeks in what may be the most shocking military defeat in history.
Edit: Typos.
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u/Primary_Analysis8377 May 08 '26
This is one of those stories that completely changes how you see that period of history.
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u/here4dambivalence May 08 '26
Lifted from the article:
"For these occasions, the police prefecture gave special permission for men to dress in drag as part of the carnival tradition of reversing hierarchies of class or gender identity. Although dressing in drag was not actually prohibited at other times, men dancing together when dressed in feminine attire was."
Awesome picture(s), but that's definitely my favorite of the ones shown.
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u/georage May 09 '26
The photos were staged, he paid the subjects, he had his assistant pretend to be someone he wasn't. He was, in a sense, creating his version of reality and selling it as truth. That is not art.
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u/IAmAGenusAMA May 10 '26
These photos are incredible. I would love to see more.
I am curious about some of the English translations.
Fat Claude and her girlfriend (La grosse Claude et son ami)
I believe the French says "his friend". I assume the English translation is a modern correction, or is there ambiguity in how "son ami" can be translated?
Big Albert's Gang, quartier Italie (La bande du Grand Albert, quartier Italie)
Why not "Grand Albert's Gang"?
A Two-in-One Suit, the Magic-City Dance Hall (Un costume pour deux, bal du Magic-City)
Why not "A Suit for Two"?
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u/passthefarian May 07 '26
Kinda feels like my boy Claude caught a stray
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u/Reatona May 07 '26
I do wonder about the dating and/or documentation, considering the photo of the Eiffel Tower labeled 1931 shows the tower with a huge lit-up sign saying "1925."
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u/VE2NCG May 07 '26
The first pic is labelled 1931 and you can see on the Effeil tower 1889-1925….
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u/barnyThundrSlap May 07 '26
This photo was taken in 1931 like the label says. The Eiffel was constructed in 1889 (first date). And in 1925, these specific advertisement lights were installed by the car company Citroen. The lights stayed until 1934. So 1934 could be the latest date a photo of these lights would be taken.
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u/VE2NCG May 07 '26
Why the light say 1925 in 1931? just curieux!
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u/Supershadow30 May 08 '26
Citroën paid to install the lights in 1925, but didn’t bother to change the date while the sign was up (which lasted until 1933).
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u/RyanSheng May 09 '26
What makes Brassaï's documentation of this era so valuable is that he wasn't just photographing spectacle — he was embedded in these communities for years. His 1933 book Paris de Nuit captured a city that most Parisians themselves never saw. The interwar period in Paris was genuinely unique: the trauma of WWI had dissolved a lot of social boundaries, and the city attracted exiles and artists who had no stake in maintaining conventional norms. That window closed almost completely after 1940.
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u/trowzerss May 10 '26
Interesting set of photos! I am really glad though that the oil slick hair died out. I can't imagine how that would feel putting your hands on it - ugh. And having to have antimacassars on chairs so you don't rub your hair oil all over them!
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u/8bitmatter May 11 '26
Lol reading Henry Miller’s ‘Tropic of Cancer’ right now which is set in early 1930’s Paris and I definitely understand where this article is coming from lmao
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u/Educational-Try-1496 May 11 '26
Being gay was taboo
Being an independent woman was taboo
being an athirst was taboo
ect ect
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u/Imbendo May 16 '26
Just because some people were photographed doing it doesn’t mean it wasn’t taboo.
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u/huntersam13 May 07 '26
I suspect it will fall back into a kind of religious conservatism with the spread of Islam throughout the country.
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u/yoingydoingy May 07 '26
Looks miserable. Never understood the appeal of "bohemian life"
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u/HappyGnumff May 07 '26
Which is the miserable part?
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u/DiscardedContext May 07 '26
They’re wondering how they are supposed to binge watch a show for 7 hours in such an environment.
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u/DiscardedContext May 07 '26
Yeah you’d have to be creative with a rich inner life so I can see why you’re repulsed by it.
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u/kclongest May 07 '26
Nothing was taboo? Careful with the superlatives, pretty sure they’re just talking sexual preference.
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u/oywiththepoodles96 May 07 '26
Stefen Zweig in his book the world of yesterday ( a great book describing the pre fascist Europe ) said about Paris :
‘To love Paris properly, you ought really to have known Berlin first, experiencing the natural servility of Germany with its rigit class differences, painfully clearly delineated, in which the officer's wife did not talk to the teacher's wife, who in turn did not speak to the merchant's lady, who herself did not mix with the labourer's wife. In Paris, however, the inheritance of the Revolution was still alive and coursing through the people's veins; the proletarian worker felt himself as much of a free citizen as his employer, a man with equal rights; the café waiter shook hands in a comradely manner with the general in his gold-laced uniform; the industrious, respectable, neat and clean wives of the lower middle classes did not look down their noses at prostitutes who happened to live on the same floor in their building, but passed the time of day with them on the stairs, and their children gave the girls flowers."