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Arts & Culture

The Flâneur in 19th-Century Parisian Visual Culture

Quick fact

Charles Baudelaire coined the flâneur as the 'painter of modern life'—an artist-observer who moved through the city crowds, capturing the fleeting beauty of contemporary reality, a stark contrast to the academic art of the time.

Why this is interesting

Imagine strolling through the glittering arcades of 19th-century Paris, a stranger in the crowd, observing everything yet belonging nowhere. This observer was the flâneur—but who exactly was he, and why did his idle walk define modern visual culture?